Space Force Presents: Operation Drag Queen

[CMDR Cknarf]

Honestly, if they cut this out of the update before it drops, it might restore a bit of the faith I used to have in Fdev.

 

[Bigmaec]

I don't see the Reapers participating simply because our mission in Colonia takes priority. Besides that I'm more than happy to leave this kind of thing to the professionals.

Totally got my drag seekers ready to go. Gonna mod some frags I brought from the Bubble too, see how it goes. You're down for some science, right BigMaec?

For the good of the game

 

[Vasco Sapien]

Do you think an OP weapon like this would get ignored by people trying to gank you?

No off course not, The OP's initiative aside to rally the plebs this weapon mod could become the go to choice for any non-PvP Open play commander. Fling mud in the eye of any attacking ship and run for it.

If every PvE player in open equipped this mod for its obvious usefulness, what would the belligerent PvP crowd do to counter it?

Just equipt the same?... and both sides be forced to fly around each other very slowly until one flakes, or would it force a change in strategy?

Would everyone just be using this? or would some get bored?

(belligerent PvP is in reference the fact that not all PvP players are gankers)

 

[Interstellar Overdrive]

Greetings.

With the wonderful set of patch notes we received yesterday, there lurked a sinister line item that nearly went unnoticed. After the PvP community picked our collective jaws up off of the floor, we headed over to /r/pitchforkemporium to get ready for the incoming dark ages and began rage-posting on reddit and the FDev forums.


As usual for FDev, they posted the patch notes then went radio silent for the rest of the day, providing no context or justification for the changes or even attempting to ameliorate the forum poopoostorm that had been kicked up.

What did this change do?
Drag munitions is an effect for seeker missiles and frag cannons that, when applied, makes the victim ship behave as if it had 0 pips to engines for 5 seconds (with no cooldown). Ships with 0 pips cannot turn easily to avoid incoming damage or to get their weapons back on their attacker. As-is, this effect was strong because of the window it gave to land a big round of DPS on your opponent with little risk to yourself. Mostly it was used on packhounds and seekers as these weapons do not have to be aimed. Annoying, but generally considered to be balanced because you could get away from it or mitigate with countermeasures.

But, according to the FDev brain trust, this was not strong enough. The change pushed to servers today retains all of the previous effects and adds another one: no boosting during the 5 second effect window. Previously, you could boost to get out of the drag effect a bit, making it so you wouldn't simply drift like an idiot. With this change, you can be hit every 5 seconds and be unable to boost or maneuver effectively for an entire fight against a skilled opponent and there is nothing you can do but leave.


How does this affect PvP?
It will be similar to how the heat meta used to be where the first person to land the effect on an opponent wins by default. Once struck, you will have a fraction of the agility of your opponent, who is now free to dump every bit of damage they want into you and you can do nothing about it other than leave the fight or die. This single change has the potential to turn FA-off fights against skilled opponents into shield stacked, 4-0-2 pip, face-tanking due to the absolute disadvantage you will have if you don't also run drag munitions and build your ship to survive such a fight.


Victims of ganking will now likely not be capable of escaping where they were able to previously. Before, you could be reasonably evasive and avoid a lot of incoming damage by boosting around unpredictably and that is no longer possible, so to survive, you need to tank every bit of damage coming your way. For all but the most well prepared players, people will be dying where they otherwise wouldn't be.

What are we going to do about it?
We're going to do what we usually do, which is shoot people with them. SDC/Nomads/Prism and others will be dispatching our most elite content delivery specialists to busy areas around the bubble to demonstrate to other players just how broken these weapons are. We will not be shooting other PvPers with them (just like with SpicyBois) and will be solely shooting players minding their own business, imploring them to take to the forums to voice their opinions on the new changes.

As always, when FDev pushes the fix, the carnage will stop.

Happy ganking, friends.

I really hope they have more sense than that but if the effect is indeed changed as described then I will have my current bubble account join in the fun.

 

[pzykozomatik]

Boosting all the time is really unecological and produces more pollution and harmful emissions to our environment! Save the space! Finally someone is doing something about it. We only have this one galaxy.

Byproducts of spaceship engines "polluting" the environment, people using terrorist methods to prove their point, hmmm, what does that remind me of?

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Force_of_Nature_(episode)

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

No off course not, The OP's initiative aside to rally the plebs this weapon mod could become the go to choice for any non-PvP Open play commander. Fling mud in the eye of any attacking ship and run for it.

If every PvE player in open equipped this mod for its obvious usefulness, what would the belligerent PvP crowd do to counter it?

Just equipt the same?... and both sides be forced to fly around each other very slowly until one flakes, or would it force a change in strategy?

Would everyone just be using this? or would some get bored?

(belligerent PvP is in reference the fact that not all PvP players are gankers)

"Drags or die" is bad. Period.

 

[Icooperzzz]

Looking forward to some Operation Drag Queen later! Just gotta make a quick trip to Nemo after work!

 

[Krash]

Ganking will commence from these groups: SDC/Nomads/Prism ??

And how is that any different?

 

[Slange Lands]

No off course not, The OP's initiative aside to rally the plebs this weapon mod could become the go to choice for any non-PvP Open play commander. Fling mud in the eye of any attacking ship and run for it.

If every PvE player in open equipped this mod for its obvious usefulness, what would the belligerent PvP crowd do to counter it?

Just equipt the same?... and both sides be forced to fly around each other very slowly until one flakes, or would it force a change in strategy?

Would everyone just be using this? or would some get bored?

(belligerent PvP is in reference the fact that not all PvP players are gankers)

Unfortunately, the end will be the same because PvP ships will now be built for exclusively MJ. Most PvE ships, in order to trade or explore will not be able to compete megajoule-wise. It will be a boring, interminable and inevitable war between two fat sitting ducks.

quack

o7

 

[Vasco Sapien]

Looking forward to some Operation Drag Queen later! Just gotta make a quick trip to Nemo after work!

Maybe for the next few days, people should just play in Solo or PG.
I personally don't feel that this initiative is going to achieve anything, it seems to me that advertising the plan here before hand was kinda silly.

 

[Midian Cabal]

Ganking will commence from these groups: SDC/Nomads/Prism ??

And how is that any different?

It's not oportunistic, now it's a concentrated effort.

 

[ryan_m]

Maybe for the next few days, people should just play in Solo or PG.
I personally don't feel that this initiative is going to achieve anything, it seems to me that advertising the plan here before hand was kinda silly.

It's worked every time we've done it before.

 

[Vardaugas]

It's worked every time we've done it before.

Rest assured, your tantrums never had any influence.

 

[ryan_m]

Rest assured, your tantrums never had any influence.

They absolutely did, contrary to your uninformed opinion.

 

[Vasco Sapien]

It's worked every time we've done it before.

If it ain't broke..

 

[Krash]

It's not oportunistic, now it's a concentrated effort.

Yes and anyone paying attention will already have drag ready on their own ship. Checkmate.

 

[Vardaugas]

They absolutely did, contrary to your uninformed opinion.

If that's what you need to tell yourself to sleep at night...

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

Ganking will commence from these groups: SDC/Nomads/Prism ??

And how is that any different?

You folks cry they do it for no reason. They find a reason they honestly believe in and you just downplay it.

k!

 

[Nemac]

wow you found a reason to grief fast. not supporting this.

I am allowed my opinions and I have made, what I think you'll find, is an accurate summary of your post. If I have however made a mistake in my interpretation then feel free to point it out. Unless you have already played with these changes, then you are making an assumption based on one line of text, and already threatening FD and players because of it.

strong troll is stronk. obviously you have support faildev in this mess they make for no reason.

@all please do a search / replace Fdev -> FailDev.

 

[Krash]

You folks cry they do it for no reason. They find a reason they honestly believe in and you just downplay it.

k!

Reasons or no reasons it all looks the same to me.