So I can't block carebears hiding in their G5 fortresses. But I can block carebears hiding in their Prismatic shield-booster stacked fortresses!
Engineering Under Threat - Open Letter etc
- Thread starter Gavin786
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Ok cool glad i didn't read it all then thanks!
Nerf'd top level stuff(equivalent) is basically already available in most stations
All of it is godrolled legacy
Engineering should not be a pure case of power-creep, there needs to be BALANCED trade-offs for any net gains. Engineering should provide tactical choice, not an I-WIN button.
In the case of weapons - damage, PP requirements, PD requirements, Heat efficiency, bullet speed/accuracy, refire rate, and range should be traded off against each other with the net effect being a balanced and reasonable outcome. The problem, in this case is less with the current engineering balance IMO but rather with the grand fathered balance which arguably is OP in some cases.
In the case of shields - resistance, strength, PP requirements, and PD requirements need to be traded off against each other. There have been long standing issues with this even before engineering and the key note problem is booster stacking. Stronger shields should be less resistant to non-absolute damage types for example.
Overall, FD should probably be concentrating on bringing grand fathered kit into line with the official baseline - if that means reducing damage to avoid increasing PD/PP draw (where doing so could potentially make an existing build unworkable) in such cases then that is what they should do. Similarly shields than have been boosted using legacy engineering should probably have their resistance level dropped so that the net effect is there is a reasonable counter to both undersized and extreme levels of shields in combat circumstances.
I agree that any tweaking to engineering needs to be done carefully but it still needs to be done - at least in some areas. This should be done with sensible and balanced trade-offs rather than diminishing returns or soft/hard caps.
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I mostly disagree with this sentiment - because engineering ought not to have been about pure buff - like you appear to be commending.
Instead, there ought to always have been some balancing issues for the individual to address (not balance between different CMDR's builds, but balance for each individual modification). We got that in a very small way - like overcharged MCs increase DPS, but at a small cost to power consumption. Really, the power consumption increase ought to have been greater than the DPS increase.
I would liken this to increasing a car's horsepower. Each increased step of engine horsepower, in the real world, comes at exponential cost steps. For instance, to increase the bhp output on my Evo from 300-ish to 350-ish costs in the region of £500 to £1,000. To add another 50 bhp the costs spiral upwards and the next extra 50bhp, taking it from 350 to 400, the costs are now £1,500 to £2,500 over and above the already upgraded 350bhp. Moreover, the first extra 50 bhp might gain you 4 secs a lap of a race circuit, if you're lucky. That's 4 sec per lap improvement for £500. However, the next spend of £2,000, let's say, would only improve your lap time by a further 2 sec. This is the inescapable law of diminishing returns. On both the power versus investment, as well as the lap time gained versus power. So what we're now discussing, for the final outcome of raw lap time potential versus cost, is the law of diminishing returns SQUARED.
Engineering in Elite ought to have been similarly embodied.
As the example - increased DPS from MCs - add 10% DPS for increase of 30% power draw; add 15% DPS for increase of 90% power draw; add 20% DPS for increase of 180% power draw, or numbers somewhere in that relative curve. Shield hitpoints and hull reinforcement ought to follow a silmilar principle. where the drawbacks to shield is power consumption - which then affects your ability to deploy weapons - in a far larger way than what we have now, and hull reinforcement comes at the diminishing returns against weight, which adversely affects acceleration/deceleration and manoeuvrability - both far, far more than it does now.
It ought to be up to the individual CMDR how he likes to fight to his strengths and to leverage those strengths while defending against the inherent weaknesses imposed by his choices. (The so-called "consequences" that so very many CMDRs evangelise about - while those evangelists always ensure they eradicate any chance of "consequences" to themselves - through the medium of boners engineering.). Instead of what we have now, which is pretty much a large benefit for little cost and a larger benefit for less increased cost overall. Kind of an inverse squared law of cost versus returns.
That would open up a whole new dimension to combat engagements in particular. What we have now is a one-tactic affair - where you know your build responds best to one line of tactics. Instead - the second by second tactical choices wold be much more dynamic in an environment where actual trade-offs were taking place in engineering. For example, it might be that there is a limited opening to choose to go all-out attritional, but the opening is finite, and once past that opening it is not tactically sound to press for attrition, instead taking a more defensive stance until the window of opportunity might open again.
(And I know what I'm talking about here from real world air combat - if anyone knows anything about one-circle versus two-circle air combat engagements; and moments when you can press toward an advantage that if you don't attain it in time, it rapidly becomes a disadvantage to you... and that you need to recognise the closing window and honour that threat before it actually closes on you.)
If game PvP were more like this, a balancing of your own capabilities, then I might become interested. But it isn't. And symmetrical engagements are just not interesting. While asymmetrical engagements are far too asymmetrical.
I personally don't want to see this either. I've witnessed the results of this design philosophy in other games and it invariably ends up maiking the PvE experience a far more drab and boring affair. If Frontier is reading this and now we're 'all about the community votes', i'd like to register a no for this.
Maybe just make engineering up to and including G3 a whole lot more accessible?
Everyone gets a taste of the system and can easily bring their ships up to a sensible level. If you really want those G5 mods then you need to put in some more effort.
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i.e. to be able to access them without unlocking the engineer i.e. at a suitably advanced station or base.
Everyone gets a taste of the system and can easily bring their ships up to a sensible level. If you really want those G5 mods then you need to put in some more effort.
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i.e. to be able to access them without unlocking the engineer i.e. at a suitably advanced station or base.
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Falsify me, but don't we already have this? Just 5 to 6 rolls and your module is G3-maxed. Wouldn't change a bit making a stand against salt-miners.
I preferred PvP before engineering, and in that brief phase of silent running builds, engineering has made combat worse for me. Even against NPCs it was far more fun when humans didn't have huge advantages over them.
And of course you could be in a multirole, and be statistically weaker than a pure combat ship, but the difference wasn't so large skill couldn't make up the difference.
I'd vote for engineering to be sidegrades, minor upgrades, but not rampant powercreep. Lower TTK.
Oh and revert the FDL's buff to the powerplant. Just back to how it was, which would at least reign it in a little.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dHdsYrmKnM
And of course you could be in a multirole, and be statistically weaker than a pure combat ship, but the difference wasn't so large skill couldn't make up the difference.
I'd vote for engineering to be sidegrades, minor upgrades, but not rampant powercreep. Lower TTK.
Oh and revert the FDL's buff to the powerplant. Just back to how it was, which would at least reign it in a little.
As long as weapons get buffed too, eg:
That is already the case. G3 mods are trivial to get.
I've amended my OP. Clearly i should have been more specific in what I meant: i.e. to be able to access them (up to G3 mods) without unlocking the engineer i.e. at a suitably advanced station or base.
Okay...would decrease "the grind" a bit. But nevertheless, as long engineering remains as it is, it's just another useless creditsink in my eyes.
the engineer helps the gank, and I don't support the gank. with the engineer, you don't win victories, you buy them.
instead of complaining that engineering has made the game minus it irrelevant and how this creates a vacuum in the lower end of the skill curve, and hinders player distribution, you complain of the chance of losing easy wins and the opportunity to throw your weight around.
I'm not passing judgements on engineering here because I haven't thought about what to do about it if it's removed, but I don't really like it, I don't really like the way it works, and I don't really like how much time it takes. I think it has some small potential to inspire some interesting running scenarios, but that's as much down to the varied requirements during unlocking them and how it makes you interact with the bgs, which is still mostly the bgs' doing, and it still takes too much time.
instead of complaining that engineering has made the game minus it irrelevant and how this creates a vacuum in the lower end of the skill curve, and hinders player distribution, you complain of the chance of losing easy wins and the opportunity to throw your weight around.
I'm not passing judgements on engineering here because I haven't thought about what to do about it if it's removed, but I don't really like it, I don't really like the way it works, and I don't really like how much time it takes. I think it has some small potential to inspire some interesting running scenarios, but that's as much down to the varied requirements during unlocking them and how it makes you interact with the bgs, which is still mostly the bgs' doing, and it still takes too much time.
They’re not going to touch engineering. Not unless they want an actual pitchfork riot outside their front door in Cambridge.
Every attempt at a nerf has been brutally murdered by the community thus far (and rightly so), and they’re not going to waste company time on trying in vain again. You needn’t worry, OP.
Every attempt at a nerf has been brutally murdered by the community thus far (and rightly so), and they’re not going to waste company time on trying in vain again. You needn’t worry, OP.
Have fun with your crappy 30 lyr jump ranges on your conda then
You forget something I'm afraid. Real PvP is wingfights in rings, not boring rock-paper-scissor 1v1 reverski duels in open space.
If you nerf defences to make a duel last 2 minutes instead of 20, that will pretty much mean instadeath under the focus of multiple ships in a wingfight.
Balancing is not as easy as it seems. At the current state of the game 2v2 and 3v3 fights are fun, 4v4 and 5v5 can be okay (although the more ships are involved the less viable biweave builds become). Anything above that like 8v8 fights are simply awful (provided that you manage to set up an instance that large in the first place, because bugs).
There are a number of very serious balance problems in the the game, but it's not only (and not primarily) the hitpoint inflation.
For instance hulltank/biweave ships (which could be much more fun than pure shieldtanking) suffer from a lot of bugs and bad design choices like
- the idiotic canopy mechanics - it's not fun to (pretty much) lose your ability to fight back a few seconds after shield drop because RNG,
- shadowrams are omnipresent and the ramming damage calculation itself is very inconsistent and fishy,
- a number of OP effects like corrosive and scramble spectrum only affects shieldless ships,
- some modules like distributors are very vulnerable to superpen rails which are pretty easy to use from afar using the dumbest reverski tactics,
- low skill weapons like seekers and packhounds will kill your external modules (including your weapons) pretty quickly
Also, utterly idiotic things like damage increasing ammo (grind-to-win) and healing weapons (what kind of oxymoron is that?) should absolutely go away (along with combat logging ofc).
Engineering in itself is fine, but it should be much much more easily accessible (material traders' ripoff rates anyone?).
Except that is an unfair penalty for anyone who encounters internet issues outside of their control. Anyone who thinks that proposal is reasonable is out of their tiny mind.
[EDIT]If people have issues with encountering combat logging incidents, report them to FD and let them deal with it as they see fit. The report feature is there for such cases, use it. FD will of course need to look at each report and identify trends, investigate, then act appropriately.[EDIT]
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because it is 100% necessary to throw out the non-combat-related good points of engineering, when throwing out the bad game-ruining combat-related aspects of engineering while we're talking about how engineering affects combat balance.