Frontier, it's time you balanced ALL ships and internals- Size/Mass.

[Stinja]

The key to survive is add new content(Good content), Rebalance things, make things progress and NEVER let the player stagnated on the same place for too much time - ALSO PVP - this is the more important to a game survive.

How is PvP working out for Warframe?
Last time I played it was an all-but ignore sideline, despite the devs kept trying to push it. PvE co-op was definitely where the vast majority spent their time.

But Digital Extremes does do many things better, including communication the fan-feedback loop, and rebalancing: at least when I last played, which was a while ago now.

As mentioned in this thread already, Elite does have (need?) ship progression, but also viable choices for gameplay styles. Too often it feels like there's a very limited selection of ships for an activity.

I'm of the opinion that 30-odd ships is enough, and instead of adding new ships (requiring dev resources produce, although artists etc may not be working on gameplay development) they could just rebalance existing ships to add or plug holes.

eg: a bunch of new medium ships have been added, many ultimately are very, very similar in role/style. But where's the medium ship that is a true medium-Cobra MK3 / medium-Clipper?
That very fast (A-rated 440m/s boost), but fragile-ish multirole. The Krait is just too slow to fit that gap, and probably 1 slot too many.

I wouldn't complain if Fdev shook things up, with a good hard look at every ship, vertical and horizontal progression, and yes nerfing the Anaconda. If players are stuck, just forcibly move them to an unstuck system, can't be too hard to run a script to check for (new) jump-ranges and travel back to the bubble.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

I can't help but agree with this, the Conda is a great ship. I want more great ships like this, not to nerf the good ones.

But that said, one of my other arguments is that of the big three, the Conda is too light/too tough, the Cutter is too fast/has too big a base shield, and that the Vette is the one that's got sensible stats.

+rep, except for the last sentence - I disagree that the Conda is too light/tough or that the Cutter is too fast/has too big a base shield. All ships have a certain character and characteristic. Take the Cutter, for instance - moves like a fish - steers like a cow! Take the Anaconda - tough, yes, too tough? I think not, for my engineered Conda was vapourised in about 30 seconds by some scoundrel who took advantage of its then AX loadout and somewhat battlescarred from a Thargoid.

Yes. All ships have their advantages and disadvantages - Conda has less time on target than a Corvette, Cutter takes a couple of solar systems to turn around, all three aforementioned cannot dock at Outposts, limiting the types of missions you can do to only what's available at bigger starports. Couple all that with ED being a fantasy space non-simulater-type videogame with an awful lot of realism being turfed out the window to boot, and threads like these - for there have been many throught the years - are arrant nonsense

Can you imagine the pitchforks and burning torches that would result in suddenly making the Anaconda heavier, just to satisfy a minority of folk's ludicrous wish for more 'realism' or 'IMMERSHUNZ'? I'd be right at the front of the bloodthirsty mob.

 

[House0fDerp]

If the Anaconda is so fantastic at everything, how come I can't dock one at an Outpost.

Yeah.

In other words - quit blathering about the Anaconda - it does a lot of things very well, it has a fantastic jump range which can be made even better with tinkering - but ask it to dock at Outposts and it'll gibber incoherently.

No large ship can land at an outpost, so not landing on a outpost doesn't mean any large ship is balanced when looking at it's large peers. It's wholly irrelevant.

 

[Riverside]

+rep, except for the last sentence - I disagree that the Conda is too light/tough or that the Cutter is too fast/has too big a base shield. All ships have a certain character and characteristic. Take the Cutter, for instance - moves like a fish - steers like a cow! Take the Anaconda - tough, yes, too tough? I think not, for my engineered Conda was vapourised in about 30 seconds by some scoundrel who took advantage of its then AX loadout and somewhat battlescarred from a Thargoid.

Yes. All ships have their advantages and disadvantages - Conda has less time on target than a Corvette, Cutter takes a couple of solar systems to turn around, all three aforementioned cannot dock at Outposts, limiting the types of missions you can do to only what's available at bigger starports. Couple all that with ED being a fantasy space non-simulater-type videogame with an awful lot of realism being turfed out the window to boot, and threads like these - for there have been many throught the years - are arrant nonsense

Can you imagine the pitchforks and burning torches that would result in suddenly making the Anaconda heavier, just to satisfy a minority of folk's ludicrous wish for more 'realism' or 'IMMERSHUNZ'? I'd be right at the front of the bloodthirsty mob.

As you quite rightly point out, one of my arguments is flawed. The popular request for buffing the Vette is to give it a better jump range and/or change the two small hardpoints to mediums.

I laid out the effects of 'correcting' the Conda a few posts ago, and said the path of least resistance would be to leave it alone. If I were forced to choose between:

Increasing mass to the Conda (reducing it's jump range & manoeuvrability)
Decreasing it's hull strength, or
Buffing the Vette

I think option 1 makes the most sense imo, but buffing the Vette would become the path of least resistance.

 

[Metal Angel]

I can’t for the life of me figure out why this overarching balance would possibly be necessary. That’s just not how things are in real life. Cars and trucks are not “balanced” in real life. Some are better than others for no good reason, some are more bang for your buck, some do a secondary thing better than others do their primary thing... this just seems like a recipe for blandness, and I think if anything it would make the “rush to the big 3” even worse.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

As you quite rightly point out, one of my arguments is flawed. The popular request for buffing the Vette is to give it a better jump range and/or change the two small hardpoints to mediums.

I laid out the effects of 'correcting' the Conda a few posts ago, and said the path of least resistance would be to leave it alone. If I were forced to choose between:

Increasing mass to the Conda (reducing it's jump range & manoeuvrability)
Decreasing it's hull strength, or
Buffing the Vette

I think option 1 makes the most sense imo, but buffing the Vette would become the path of least resistance.

In that case, sir - if any ship needs to be altered, it's the Vette in terms of jump range

No large ship can land at an outpost, so not landing on a outpost doesn't mean any large ship is balanced when looking at it's large peers. It's wholly irrelevant.

So what you're saying is....

"Yer honour, I'd like to strike that from the record!"

"Why?"

"Because it's devastating to my case! "

 

[Oscar Brannen]

Turns out this is trickier that you'd think at first blush...

AspX Mid Build - 42 MCr
T7 EX Build - 67 MCr
KM2 EX Build - 80 MCr

Obviously there are certain appreciable differences between these builds, but they all have roughly the same level of sophistication and will enable you to do roughly the same type of exploration work. We can quibble over details, but the fact that the most expensive build is 2x the cost of the cheapest while providing little more than some extra cargo room suggests at least to me that there's something that needs to be touched, right?

OTOH, only one of these ships is obviously intended to be good at exploration. Maybe the fact that you can design a much cheaper build that offers a (relatively) modest hit to performance and a vastly more expensive one that only provides a little advantage is the dev's strategy. I dunno. I see the OP's point, but there's got to be more to it than physics.

This is only one example, I bet if you did some size-limited builds for combat or trading across a few designs you'd find something similar.

 

[House0fDerp]

So what you're saying is....

"Yer honour, I'd like to strike that from the record!"

"Why?"

"Because it's devastating to my case! "

No, I'm saying the Chewbacca defense is a distraction rather than a valid reasoning.

There are 9 large ships, any of them being imbalanced with each other isn't countered by an ability that none of them have.

Turns out this is trickier that you'd think at first blush...

AspX Mid Build - 42 MCr
T7 EX Build - 67 MCr
KM2 EX Build - 80 MCr

Obviously there are certain appreciable differences between these builds, but they all have roughly the same level of sophistication and will enable you to do roughly the same type of exploration work. We can quibble over details, but the fact that the most expensive build is 2x the cost of the cheapest while providing little more than some extra cargo room suggests at least to me that there's something that needs to be touched, right?

OTOH, only one of these ships is obviously intended to be good at exploration. Maybe the fact that you can design a much cheaper build that offers a (relatively) modest hit to performance and a vastly more expensive one that only provides a little advantage is the dev's strategy. I dunno. I see the OP's point, but there's got to be more to it than physics.

This is only one example, I bet if you did some size-limited builds for combat or trading across a few designs you'd find something similar.

Worth noting that most of the cost difference there is the hull, which allows for more to be done for other purposes in the 2 more expensive ships. Arguably the lesson there is if cost is an issue you should pick the tool that does the job you want rather than the tool that does several more jobs but can be retrofitted to do the job you want while wasting the flexibility you're paying for in the hull.

 

[Sylveria]

No large ship can land at an outpost, so not landing on a outpost doesn't mean any large ship is balanced when looking at it's large peers. It's wholly irrelevant.

Exactly- and furthermore the "Balance Pass" would encompass every/all ships, not just large ones.

I can’t for the life of me figure out why this overarching balance would possibly be necessary. That’s just not how things are in real life. Cars and trucks are not “balanced” in real life. Some are better than others for no good reason, some are more bang for your buck, some do a secondary thing better than others do their primary thing... this just seems like a recipe for blandness, and I think if anything it would make the “rush to the big 3” even worse.

Because "IRL..." comparisons work out so well in other context for this game, right? The "grind" for example? "Let's just dismiss all consistency because video game."?

How about... no. How about let's make everything consistent, and Frontier can further "buff" ships as necessary moving forward?

 

[Oscar Brannen]

Arguably the lesson there is if cost is an issue you should pick the tool that does the job you want rather than the tool that does several more jobs but can be retrofitted to do the job you want while wasting the flexibility you're paying for in the hull.

True, true. I was just looking for a way to figure out if there's a real problem in the OPs point. If you fix "what I want my ship to do" to a single in game activity, at least that's a way to evaluate whether different ships and their different costs provide a commensurate advantage or handicap even if their characteristics relative to one another vary wildly. Y'know, since as the OP pointed out correctly, they do.

 

[V'larr]

No matter how you design a game, combat munchkins will optimax for advantage. Your argument is meaningless because balance is meaningless.

Eh, what? No, you just described precisely why balance is so important. And why it's such a damn shame that it's such a non-priority for so many games that market themselves as "competitive".

__

How is PvP working out for Warframe?
Last time I played it was an all-but ignore sideline, despite the devs kept trying to push it. PvE co-op was definitely where the vast majority spent their time.

But Digital Extremes does do many things better, including communication the fan-feedback loop, and rebalancing: at least when I last played, which was a while ago now.

As mentioned in this thread already, Elite does have (need?) ship progression, but also viable choices for gameplay styles. Too often it feels like there's a very limited selection of ships for an activity.

I'm of the opinion that 30-odd ships is enough, and instead of adding new ships (requiring dev resources produce, although artists etc may not be working on gameplay development) they could just rebalance existing ships to add or plug holes.

lol, Warframe...god....

DE does many things, but balancing their own game is not one of those things. The word "balance" does not exist in a game where your baseline gear and equipment are literally hundreds of times worse than other gear, and *any* weapon can be made THOUSANDS of times better via their insane modding system (why they decided to commit to copying Mass Effect 1 right down to the exact same flaws in balance, I will never understand).

Part of the reason Warframe is as popular as it is is that they make up for lack of quality with lots and lots of quantity, and lots of aesthetics; there's lots more weapons & frames than there are ships in Elite.

So I'd say new ships are welcome, but what you say remains absolutely true as well, that Fdev could do quite a lot with a balance pass.

__

I can’t for the life of me figure out why this overarching balance would possibly be necessary. That’s just not how things are in real life. Cars and trucks are not “balanced” in real life. Some are better than others for no good reason, some are more bang for your buck, some do a secondary thing better than others do their primary thing... this just seems like a recipe for blandness, and I think if anything it would make the “rush to the big 3” even worse.

I'm sorry, but that's a silly argument. Comparing game balance to IRL is silly, but bringing up IRL cars and trucks and then bringing up the word "bland" is just outright goofy. Have you LOOKED at all those cars and trucks on the road? That's about as bland and samey as it gets, mate. I haven't been able to tell one model of SUV or sedan from another for at least 15 years. How car manufacturers continue to come out with new models each and every stinking year, models that have next to no difference to the prior versions of the past 5 years, and stay in business? It's entirely beyond me.

__

Exactly- and furthermore the "Balance Pass" would encompass every/all ships, not just large ones.

How about... no. How about let's make everything consistent, and Frontier can further "buff" ships as necessary moving forward?

Amen!

 

[Sylveria]

True, true. I was just looking for a way to figure out if there's a real problem in the OPs point. If you fix "what I want my ship to do" to a single in game activity, at least that's a way to evaluate whether different ships and their different costs provide a commensurate advantage or handicap even if their characteristics relative to one another vary wildly. Y'know, since as the OP pointed out correctly, they do.

And costs can be adjusted, just as the internals can be adjusted.

Insofar as the multirole/specialization argument goes- ships that are clearly intended to be specialized should excel at their roles, and multiroles should indeed offer "variety", but not performance that exceeds specialized role ships. The issue currently is that some multiroles completely overshadow their specialized counterparts- in many aspects of the game. Not just exploration- trade, passengers, etc.

When it eventually comes down to 3 multirole ships to choose from out of 30+, that's not "variety"- it's just more of the same. Making specialized ships stand out in terms of performance does not in any way hinder existing "omni/multiroles", it just means you're choosing a ship that may not be optimal for a particular task- but the convenience of being able to perform multiple tasks is the tradeoff.

Leaving some ships intentionally "crippled" in terms of their performance while allowing some to excel by magical dev handwavium. That's what this thread is about... balance across the board. Yeah, I get it that some people don't "like" the idea.

This highlights yet another "inconsistency" because as I stated previously- some ships just don't have to sacrifice anything. Cost should not at all be a factor- prices/marketing/economy have very little to do with actual performance of a product. You can simply be a snake oil salesman and make tons of cash- but that doesn't demonstrate the product you're selling is "top notch" in terms of performance. Conflation of pricing doesn't negate the actual inconsistencies that exist.

Just to clarify- I'm a complete advocate of "player choice" and "freedom"- but what we have now isn't "freedom", it's being pigeonholed into 3-4 "optimal" ships while the other 26+ ships simply sit there because they're crippled by design inconsistency or inherent flaws by the introduction of newer ships over the years without regard to how they impact the existing ships and advantage/disadvantage.

Was it intentional? NO. I don't believe it was "intentional", nor "malicious" in the slightest. I'm not on a "warpath", nor calling for a "witch hunt" with torches and pitchforks.

It's simply an oversight that needs to be corrected.

 

[Bashy81]

The Anaconda weighs 400t. It's a large ship. Just go look at the weight of various small and medium ships. That'll tell you all you need to know.

It is not the only ship with a crazy stat anomaly.

The Clipper hull weighs 400t, and fares much better in a collision than a conda. In that direct comparison, a conda feels much like a ship with a hull thats stretched very thin. A Conda can pack much more hull reinforcement in, but has a very vulnerable powerplant.
It has weaker shields than a vette or cutter, is slower than either and less agile than a vette. The vette jumprange is worst of the three (but is now proportionally helped most by a guardian fsd booster)

In broad strokes, vette is best for combat, cutter carries most cargo, conda jumps furthest. Depending on your preferences, in practice any of the three may be the best large ship for you.
In explorer-trim especially, the conda uses a huge amount of distributor draw to boost, and is extremely slow, handles worse in SC and is much more picky over landing spots than an Asp or DBX.
The sacrifice here is QoL. Do you want a slightly better individual jump range and a full range of internals or a more nippy & convenient flying experience overall?

Conda can take bulk passengers well, but cant fit luxury cabins unlike an orca or beluga, which are clearly luxury liners in looks as well as outfitting options. The ongoing fix of luxury passenger missions is the resolution there, no shipnerfs required.

You can go around all day & night looking at the minutiae of ship comparisons as they stand.
All the pros and cons on each case are the result of years of tweaks & balances.

A major all-encompassing ship redesign would reset all that work, and bring ED back to an Alpha stage in one of its most fundamental & successful areas: the way ships fly! ..which self-immolation on the altar of a notion of consistency, would delight its beleagured competitors no end.

Tldr: Shipstats dont tell the whole story. 'sacrifices' / pros and cons come in many different forms.

 

[Sylveria]

The Clipper hull weighs 400t, and fares much better in a collision than a conda. In that direct comparison, a conda feels much like a ship with a hull thats stretched very thin. A Conda can pack much more hull reinforcement in, but has a very vulnerable powerplant.
It has weaker shields than a vette or cutter, is slower than either and less agile than a vette. The vette jumprange is worst of the three (but is now proportionally helped most by a guardian fsd booster)

Please tell me where you're basing your stats from - Anaconda has a hardness factor higher than the Clipper.

Conda can take bulk passengers well, but cant fit luxury cabins unlike an orca or beluga, which are clearly luxury liners in looks as well as outfitting options. The ongoing fix of luxury passenger missions is the resolution there, no shipnerfs required.

Yeah, sorry Luxury passenger missions don't pay anywhere near what bulk passenger missions do for the amount of time and effort involved. Really no comparison, and the entire point is completely irrelevant regardless- because it's another issue of imbalance. (which also needs correcting) Though related to the topic, it's a different system.

You can go around all day & night looking at the minutiae of ship comparisons as they stand.
All the pros and cons on each case are the result of years of tweaks & balances.

I really truly hope you don't honestly believe there's been "years of tweaks and balances". Other than the occasional cherry-picked nerf/buff for particular ships- again, when's the last time this game had an all-encompassing balance pass for ships, hmm?

A major all-encompassing ship redesign would reset all that work, and bring ED back to an Alpha stage in one of its most fundamental & successful areas: the way ships fly! ..which self-immolation on the altar of a notion of consistency, would delight its beleagured competitors no end.

Tldr: Shipstats dont tell the whole story. 'sacrifices' / pros and cons come in many different forms.

Reset what "work"? Again, we've never HAD a major all-encompassing balance pass to begin with. It's not a "redesign", it's ensuring all ships follow the same rules Frontier themselves introduced.

Shipstats do indeed tell the "whole story" in terms of balance- what you, I or anyone else chooses to do with the ship Beyond that is completely optional in terms of "sacrifice".

Again- either all ships are gimped/hampered in some way to force "principle of sacrifice" or none at all should be. Grasping at straws to save your "favorite" ship isn't going to work- even Frontier themselves have already acknowledged there's an imbalance. The only thing they haven't done is corrected it yet.

 

[Morbad]

The Clipper hull weighs 400t, and fares much better in a collision than a conda.

Relative total ship mass and closing velocity determines how much damage is done in a collision.

If your take a Clipper and an Anaconda that have similar total mass, and ram them together, each one will take a similar amount of raw damage.

Please tell me where you're basing your stats from - Anaconda has a hardness factor higher than the Clipper.

Hardness doesn't matter in collisions.

Shipstats do indeed tell the "whole story" in terms of balance- what you, I or anyone else chooses to do with the ship Beyond that is completely optional in terms of "sacrifice".

Most people appear to be ignorant of a great number of relevant statistics.

The afforementioned module locations are a good example. If armor hardness and integrity are all you are looking at, then you are omitting penetration depth (which is a fraction of the ship's narrowest dimension) and module positioning, both of which are extremely important.

A given weapon penetrates a conda ~10% deeper than a vette and many of a conda's critical modules have far more angles where they are covered by a lesser depth of hull than the vette. I run a hybrid Corvette setup, which is something that is vastly harder to do effectively with the Anaconda because the Anaconda's PP, PD, and hardpoints are much easier to cripple.

 

[Numenor1379]

Your conclusion is a logical one, but no fix will avoid frustrating some, particularly with the Conda since it's so flexible.

If you increase the mass, it will reduce the jump range of an exploration build. Arguably this is a good move since it's among the best in the game, but will frustrate (and potentially strand) explorers.

If you decrease the integrity it will reduce the hitpoints, frustrating traders & other players that rely on it's defences to save them. Arguably this is a good move too, since it's integrity is well above average.

Leaving it alone frustrates only those that have taken a peek behind the curtain & seen how the magic trick is done. Seems like the path of least resistance to me

We had a topic about the Anaconda a few months ago and actually came up with a possible solution (but will result in more power creep).

Namely, add an Engineer which can modify Hull Mass. THEN give ALL current Anacondas a built-in G5 Lightweight mod.

 

[Cageman]

Your conclusion is a logical one, but no fix will avoid frustrating some, particularly with the Conda since it's so flexible.

If you increase the mass, it will reduce the jump range of an exploration build. Arguably this is a good move since it's among the best in the game, but will frustrate (and potentially strand) explorers.

If you decrease the integrity it will reduce the hitpoints, frustrating traders & other players that rely on it's defences to save them. Arguably this is a good move too, since it's integrity is well above average.

Leaving it alone frustrates only those that have taken a peek behind the curtain & seen how the magic trick is done. Seems like the path of least resistance to me [/QUOITE]

I know it will frustrate a large segment of the player base, so maybe your right in just leaving it alone. It does frustrate me that the answer to every question is buy a Conda. Thargoids...Conda, exploration...Conda. Defensible trader...Conda. No rank lock...Conda. It's kind of a Joke.

LOL

Serious traders will recommend the Cutter, serious BH:ers will recommend the Corvette. But both those are locked behind different ranks.

The Anaconda is a nice ship, for sure, but far from the best ship at any given role, except Exploration, depending on if you are in VR or not. Even if the Anaconda is better than the ASPX or DBX in jumprange, most people who play in VR goes for ASPX or DBX, because they tend to have a much better field of vision, compared to an Anaconda.

So... it is very hard to say that a ship is "better", just based on stats.

 

[Morbad]

So... it is very hard to say that a ship is "better", just based on stats.

Almost everything can be quantified, but as I mentioned above, there are many relevant stats that seem to be habitually omitted in comparisons, if not entirely unknown by those making the comparison. The weight that should be placed on those quanta is more subjective, however.

I don't like the Anaconda as an explorer because of it's rotation rate in SC, which is horrible, and the difficulty in finding convenient places to land the ship on planet surfaces. Those considerations easily trump jump range for me when I'm actually exploring, rather than doing a long distance race or attempting to pin my name where it's difficult/impossible to reach with other vessels.

 

[House0fDerp]

The Clipper hull weighs 400t, and fares much better in a collision than a conda. In that direct comparison, a conda feels much like a ship with a hull thats stretched very thin. A Conda can pack much more hull reinforcement in, but has a very vulnerable powerplant.
It has weaker shields than a vette or cutter, is slower than either and less agile than a vette. The vette jumprange is worst of the three (but is now proportionally helped most by a guardian fsd booster)

In broad strokes, vette is best for combat, cutter carries most cargo, conda jumps furthest. Depending on your preferences, in practice any of the three may be the best large ship for you.
In explorer-trim especially, the conda uses a huge amount of distributor draw to boost, and is extremely slow, handles worse in SC and is much more picky over landing spots than an Asp or DBX.
The sacrifice here is QoL. Do you want a slightly better individual jump range and a full range of internals or a more nippy & convenient flying experience overall?

Conda can take bulk passengers well, but cant fit luxury cabins unlike an orca or beluga, which are clearly luxury liners in looks as well as outfitting options. The ongoing fix of luxury passenger missions is the resolution there, no shipnerfs required.

You can go around all day & night looking at the minutiae of ship comparisons as they stand.
All the pros and cons on each case are the result of years of tweaks & balances.

A major all-encompassing ship redesign would reset all that work, and bring ED back to an Alpha stage in one of its most fundamental & successful areas: the way ships fly! ..which self-immolation on the altar of a notion of consistency, would delight its beleagured competitors no end.

Tldr: Shipstats dont tell the whole story. 'sacrifices' / pros and cons come in many different forms.

This seems to be massively downplaying the Anaconda's inconsistent mass. We're talking about a ship that has upgraded space for internals for everything but life support and twice the number of hardpoints and utility slots.

You call it stretched thin but when the resulting stretching leaves the material twice as strong (as in raw armor HP before hardness) as it was before something isn't right.

As far as the corvette/cutter, The Conda tends to have more advantages that either. Between the 3 it has the greatest number of unrestricted optional internals giving greater flexibility, best base armor, the best DPS potential, and the best potential jump range by far. Resultingly it also has the best fitted jump range as well. It's also cheaper and not rank locked.

Ship stats do tell the whole story, you just have to look at more than one application in isolation to determine things are balanced.

LOL

Serious traders will recommend the Cutter, serious BH:ers will recommend the Corvette. But both those are locked behind different ranks.

The Anaconda is a nice ship, for sure, but far from the best ship at any given role, except Exploration, depending on if you are in VR or not. Even if the Anaconda is better than the ASPX or DBX in jumprange, most people who play in VR goes for ASPX or DBX, because they tend to have a much better field of vision, compared to an Anaconda.

So... it is very hard to say that a ship is "better", just based on stats.

A somewhat different issue. When looking at certain peaks sometimes a ship ship is still better for a specific role. IE, the lower distributor and potential damage of the cutter don't matter when trading. The higher capacity does and the player chooses how much the jump range difference matters through range selection.

Corvette has 2 class 4 HPs. Enough said really.

 

[Sylveria]

Ship stats do tell the whole story, you just have to look at more than one application in isolation to determine things are balanced.

Hey, you know... they spent a lot of time trying to convolute the main issues by providing isolated or extreme examples... at least give them some credit.

Perhaps a pence or two?