Does anyone think Fdev is ever going to rework engineering?

Ships can still die fast now . . . Paperthin lightweight ships will sometimes die in two shots +/- a ram. Big ships with prismatics, shield boosters and G5 engineering take a good while to kill . . .

"Ships still die fast . . . if they're not engineered!"

You only confirmed what @Shadowed stated re the state of combat post Horizons.
 
We're playing Warcraft in space. FD wont remove the timesink of grinding required to stomp or compete with other players. Luckily if you know where to go, the timesink is fairly short.
 
I came back to the game recently, and had played it back in 2015 (on xbox now I'm on PC) prior to the release of horizons and engineering. I'm not saying engineering should be removed or that it's a bad idea, just that in its current state it is horribly unbalanced.

For example, I decided to engage in PvP last night for s and giggles and because I had money to burn after make a few hundred million in the black. I knew full well I had little to no chance of winning a fight, but was curious. So I took my A-rated combat build Krait mkII (no engineering other than grade 1 fsd and dirty drives) and an npc Taipan slf. I engaged a Krait Phantom (fully engineered). My thrusters were disabled and my hull reduced to 1% in about a minute or 2 while his first shield bar was barely purple, and then he struggled to shoot down my npc slf for a minute or 2 while I rebooted. We had around the same window to fire on each other plus the slf on my side (I launched because of my lack of engineering). There was no clear skill gap, hell he had the far more maneuverable ship. Based on this the system seems thoroughly broken imo.

So if I ever want to engage in PvP:

A. I have to dedicate 6+ hours to collecting mats for only a few ships if that. Which let's be real not a single one of us truly enjoys doing if we do it efficiently or otherwise.

B. Try to set up PvP where we only have unengineered ships. Which seems difficult to set up.

And that's not mentioning that I hope to god I don't get ganked by someone with engineering. I know you're going to tell me to play in Solo, but that's clearly not what Fdev ever intended this game to be. The lack of offline mode, the BGS, and community events and goals all prove that they want a lively populated server for players to interact in. Also there are methods to avoid being interdicted or ganked as well, I know.

Engineering appears to have brought far more negatives than positives. It created a grind with a more than mundane gameplay loop and made it difficult for new players to join the community if they want to play in open, and there are plenty among us that have refused to even engage in the engineering system because of it. Either because it is such a grind or the power creep is so severe it makes gameplay loops unchallenging and therefore boring.

Don't get me wrong, I do love the ridiculous amount of potential for builds you can create, they absolutely nailed that, and an endgame grind should provide you an edge, just not a whole damn cliff.



TL;DR: I like the idea of engineering, but in its current state it is horribly flawed. Those with engineering should have an advantage to those that don't, BUT it shouldn't be like they enabled god mode. A The skill gap for a better unengineered pilot to beat an engineered inferior pilot shouldn't be so severe. The gameplay loops for mat gathering should be reworked and introduced more organically as well. It should be an addition to the game that increases the potential for different builds and setups, but doesn't detract from gameplay by making you so overpowered it's easy, and thus boring.
so, lets put this in a scale of 1-10

you want to use a ship that is a 5/10, and compete in combat with a ship that is possibly a 10/10, or at least, much further progressed than you?

it's like a level 5 in world of warcraft complaining about losing to a level 10
 
"Ships still die fast . . . if they're not engineered!"

You only confirmed what @Shadowed stated re the state of combat post Horizons.
The point is to take down a big G5 engineered ship in PvP requires a combination of either good skills or good organisation. If you are skilled at vectoring thrust, you can sit on its tail and kill it while it cant turn into you very well, and land grom hits to stop it charging FSD to get away. Or you can overwhelm it with a wing of 4, which requires good organisation. Engineering doesnt detract from the game- Ships might be tougher if engineered, but so are weapons. Skills and team tactics are equal to the task. It is a very rewarding challenge to beat a G5 shield tank cutter.
 
The point is to take down a big G5 engineered ship in PvP requires a combination of either good skills or good organisation. If you are skilled at vectoring thrust, you can sit on its tail and kill it while it cant turn into you very well, and land grom hits to stop it charging FSD to get away. Or you can overwhelm it with a wing of 4, which requires good organisation. Engineering doesnt detract from the game- Ships might be tougher if engineered, but so are weapons. Skills and team tactics are equal to the task. It is a very rewarding challenge to beat a G5 shield tank cutter.
Blah, blah. If there was a level playing field you wouldn't need to invent bogus tactics to take the power creep down. Instead both parties would need skill to combat each other and not just one.
 
Engineering doesnt detract from the game- Ships might be tougher if engineered, but so are weapons.

I like Engineering, I just don't like the low effort way they implemented it.

"make numbrs mor big, mor big numbr is mor funnr" - Actual dialogue from Engineering development meeting.

It is a very rewarding challenge to beat a G5 shield tank cutter.

I guess we find reward in different things. Said Cutters don't take any more skill to down, they just take a lot more of your time. Popped prolly 6 or 7 this weekend, was a snooze fest halfway through each time.
 
I'm relatively new to the game and I don't think there's anything wrong with the engineering system itself, as in what upgrades you can get and how drastically improved your ship is after getting them. The problem I have is that the most efficient farming methods aren't the least bit fun. I know I don't have to fly out to HIP 36601 and shoot rocks all day. I know I don't have to farm High Grade Emissions spots. I know I don't have to sit at the Jameson Crash Site and scan beacons. But those are the most effective ways of getting what we want. What they should do is introduce more engaging systems for material farming that are equally as profitable. There should at least be an obviously deterministic way of finding certain mats as mission rewards, and mission reward payout for materials should be adjusted so that completing materials-focused Elite rank missions fills up your highest grade storage after like 10 runs max.

If the game is the grind then the grind itself should be fun. See games like Monster Hunter for reference.
 
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Blah, blah. If there was a level playing field you wouldn't need to invent bogus tactics to take the power creep down. Instead both parties would need skill to combat each other and not just one.

Bogus tactics? What could possibly be bogus about staying out of the arc of fire of a big ship?
Since you think it bogus, I assume your idea of tactics would be to stay in front of the Class 4 guns. Lets me know how that works out for you.
 
You folks have no idea what TRUE grinding is like if you are that worried about engineering (although Palin may be somewhat close). Go get a skyscale in Guild Wars 2 and THEN you will know what a real grind is.
 
How can anyone say Engineering is in a good state currently? Just look at the numbers, just compare two FASs.

W/o Enginnering: https://s.orbis.zone/dyyx
Engineered: https://s.orbis.zone/dyyz

It would take 4:28 for the unengineered ship to strip the armor of the enginnered one and 1:05 the other way round. For the shield it is 17 sec vs. 4 sec(!) in the best of cases. The modded ship is more than twice as capable. Even PvE is not really balanced around this. A HAZ REZ becomes a training ground in such a modded FAS. You will not even loose your (comparatively tiny) shield even if you fly only half-way decent.

Edit:
Then things were added to game. No time for careful design and balancing, because the game is released and players want PATCH NOW!!1
To be fair to the players, 2.1 was delayed by FDev.

Edit2: In a response to later posts saying weapons are better too, when engineered. That is correct, but overall defensive modules are way stronger when modded. Two modded FAS from above take more than 3x longer to kill each other than the two A-rated ones.
 
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so, lets put this in a scale of 1-10

you want to use a ship that is a 5/10, and compete in combat with a ship that is possibly a 10/10, or at least, much further progressed than you?

it's like a level 5 in world of warcraft complaining about losing to a level 10
Ya this game:

1. Was not supposed to be like WoW. (which I hate that model of game, just go play EVE then if you don't like combat based on mechanical skill and want a hellish grind)

2. I wasn't trying to enter PvP. I was more curious what the disparity between a fully engineered ship and an A-rated ship was. I'm saying that disparity is far too wide. Especially when this game was intended to be played in open and other people abuse this disparity. It is not a healthy system that invites newcomers to the game. I made builds to compare in coriolis. My A-rated ship with a Bi-weave generator will never get its shields back before my hull is shredded against a competent pilot.
 
My A-rated ship with a Bi-weave generator will never get its shields back before my hull is shredded against a competent pilot.

I highlighted the important part.

The gap is very wide between engineered & vanilla yes, but the gap between a stock ship with E-rated modules & an A-rated one is big too. That E-A gap is no longer really a concern because cash is far, far easier to obtain now than it was.

So the issue with engineering isn't really the gap, it's just how easily the best equipment can be obtained to feel competitive, primarily against other players.
 
I still feel like Elite 1.5 was the best. 2.0 aka Horizons ruined fast paced pvp. Ships died fast back then.
Best PC game ever imo (and i have been playing space games since the 90's) and they just ed all over it introducing grind to sell cosmetics.
 
1.6 iirc was when engineers dropped. I got to play a few weeks before that and the engineers update was extremely disappointing. It was apparent shortly that the engineers would kill the balance of the game, but FD needs to sell paintjobs. The current version is better than the first, but its still crap.
 
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What new grind was introduced to sell which cosmetics? Genuinely curious.
1.6 iirc was when engineers dropped. I got to play a few weeks before that and the engineers update was extremely disappointing. It was apparent shortly that the engineers would kill the balance of the game, but FD needs to sell paintjobs. The current version is better than the first, but its still crap.
Not sure how engineering = paintjojbs.

I have several unengineered ships, but they all have paintjobs (a couple is just the Azure).

Your conflating two entirely different things.
 
1.6 iirc was when engineers dropped. I got to play a few weeks before that and the engineers update was extremely disappointing. It was apparent shortly that the engineers would kill the balance of the game, but FD needs to sell paintjobs. The current version is better than the first, but its still crap.
Paintjobs and engineering are totally different things. You don't have to engage with either of them, though admittedly engineering has introduced powercreep, but that's more an issue in Open.
 
The gap is very wide between engineered & vanilla yes, but the gap between a stock ship with E-rated modules & an A-rated one is big too. That E-A gap is no longer really a concern because cash is far, far easier to obtain now than it was.

I agree the gap between E to A is massive but I was more okay with that for some reason? I guess I approached with the logic of cars. Take a Subaru WRX (popular as a tuner and used for rally racing) for example as a stock model and it's going to be a fine commuter and you could street race (combat) with it but it's anything from its full potential. You could take it offroad (exploring) but you'll get stuck if you try anything moderately challenging or go for extended periods of time. That's where buying new components (modules) come in A-E.

Engineering should just be getting custom made parts that perform better to a degree but won't (and shouldn't) enhance performance 3, 4, or even 5 fold from A.

PS: I will say I could care less about FSD, sensor mods and others of a similar type since those are purely QoL improvements and don't really harm anything. It's the weapons, especially shield and hull mods, and thrusters to a degree that I have my main complaints.
 
I agree the gap between E to A is massive but I was more okay with that for some reason? I guess I approached with the logic of cars. Take a Subaru WRX (popular as a tuner and used for rally racing) for example as a stock model and it's going to be a fine commuter and you could street race (combat) with it but it's anything from its full potential. You could take it offroad (exploring) but you'll get stuck if you try anything moderately challenging or go for extended periods of time. That's where buying new components (modules) come in A-E.

Engineering should just be getting custom made parts that perform better to a degree but won't (and shouldn't) enhance performance 3, 4, or even 5 fold from A.

PS: I will say I could care less about FSD, sensor mods and others of a similar type since those are purely QoL improvements and don't really harm anything. It's the weapons, especially shield and hull mods, and thrusters to a degree that I have my main complaints.
Buying higher grade modules works because getting credits is much less based on RNG than materials and you have a lot more freedom in how you get them. You don't need a specific type of mining credit to upgrade your mining gear, for example. Also you don't need to buy a module multiple times to get the best performance, nor do you have to get all the previous grades of a module before you can buy its A grade. It's grindy and a big power increase sure, but it's a much more streamlined experience.

The other big problem with engineering is that all the upgrades are percentage based and they all cost the same amount of materials regardless of modules size and grade, which skews things heavily in favour of larger ships. Upgraded shield boosters/shield generators are the most extreme example.

I agree about FSD ranges, they can stay where they are (execpt maybe the Anaconda, that seems like a weird oversight).
 
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