What you do not understand is that they are mutually exclusive. SCB's set the rules for the builds. I'm not upset...nor do I actually care that they exist...I just play around them. It is just sad that they force people to play certain ways. I only express my opinion as to why they should be changed. Sorry that you disagree.
Goodbye Open til SCB issue is sorted
- Thread starter Achilles7
- Start date
What you do not understand is that they are mutually exclusive. SCB's set the rules for the builds. I'm not upset...nor do I actually care that they exist...I just play around them. It is just sad that they force people to play certain ways. I only express my opinion as to why they should be changed. Sorry that you disagree.
almostpilot
Banned
I think, for us, not interested in PVP, but still playing in open doing another things, SCB is a good thing for defence.
I really hope FD do not change it.
I really hope FD do not change it.
You are wrong. What you do not understand is that the SCBs are not creating this mutual exclusivity. An SCB increases a ship's fighting potential. A CIII with SCBs may have more fighting potential than an asp without.
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Example: if I was in an armed trader asp and I was interdicted by a pirate CIII with limpets, then I would likely beat that CIII fifty shades of blue. But if I was in that same armed trader asp and I was interdicted by a fighter CIII with SCBs, then that fight may turn out completely differently.
On the other hand if it were a pirate adder, it would likely not matter whether they brought SCBs or not. Even with SCBs, an adder's fighting potential will likely not exceed that of that armed trader asp.
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There is exactly nothing wrong with these scenarios.
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Ok. Enjoy!
I think (and I have posted on the forum before) that using a SCB is a valid choice and if you're using them, you are sacrificing space and power for other equipment.
But there is one other thing that breaks PVP, and that's chaff. It really needs to be dealt with the same way as SCB.
I think both should be limited to 1 per ship.
And in addition to that, I think it should be possible to switch a gimballed weapon to fixed mode (but of course still with less damage per second than the real fixed counterpart) without giving up target lock.
But there is one other thing that breaks PVP, and that's chaff. It really needs to be dealt with the same way as SCB.
I think both should be limited to 1 per ship.
And in addition to that, I think it should be possible to switch a gimballed weapon to fixed mode (but of course still with less damage per second than the real fixed counterpart) without giving up target lock.
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The problem isn't the sacrifice that's being made, it's the effect on the style of combat. SCB fights tend to be long and unexciting. Pre SCB were medium-fast dogfights.
I do agree gimballed needs to be able to be switched to fixed mode though. You can just unlock from target but then you lose the HUD of his health and stuff. Not sure if chaff needs to be limited if such a toggle was implemented though. They're spaming chaff?>Just switch to fixed. But then I use all fixed all the time so I'm kinda biased.
+if SCBs got limited chaff would be less used as shield boosters and PDTs would be more important. PDTs are almost never used currently because the shield meta counter missiles anyway.
Fixed weapons have a very narrow range of auto-lock while unselected weapons do not, which is one of the advantages of chosing fixed.
I don't think there needs to be a toggle mode on gimbaled weapons, deselection is plenty. If you really need to check their condition you can select them again.
I think chaff is in a pretty good spot right now. We already saw an ammo reduction from 31 to 11.
I disagree. Chaff will be used more because a chaff launcher is almost certainly worth more than even an A booster. Not every one makes heavy use of gimbals, but enough people do that not running chaff on anything besides the largest of vessels is very risky.
If the ship doesn't have many module slots, chaff is the better option than boosters, because it's a light, low power module, and damage mitigation trumps damage absorption.
If the ship does have many module slots, you have room for both boosters and chaff, because filling all slots with boosters requires too much power anyway.
If SCBs disappeared, I'd put more chaff on, not less, and I'd be able to fit stronger boosters. I would probably ditch the heatsink launcher, because 90% of the time, I only use heatsinks to keep from melting all of my subsystems while activating multiple SCBs while I'm already warm from firing.
The cut off point is at the Python level. Python, Clippers, and Anaconda do better with boosters than with chaff because they are either large (Clipper), relatively slow (Python), or both (Anaconda).
The Clipper would still see some use in PvP, and would still benefit most from an all booster setup, but they will mostly be relegated to hit and run attacks.
Very few people will take a Python or Anaconda into battle without SCBs, because they are extremely vulnerable without them. Back in Beta 1 and prior you saw Anaconda in PvP combat because the next ship down was the Viper. Now that there are things like Vultures and FDLs about, an Anaconda without SCBs can see it's shields collapse frighteningly quickly against these much cheaper vessels.
Indeed, I think I recall FD stating that this was the prime reason for SCB's in the first place...to increase the variety of ships on the battlefield, because without it, people were unwilling to risk the quick destruction of more expensive craft. You can still lose these ships wityh SCBs, but their presence gives the impression of a safety net. Sometimes this is a false impression, sometimes it's an accurate one.
Lack of SCBs won't make PDTs viable either. Explosive weapons do virtually no damage to sheilds, and lack of SCBs won't be an incentive to fight after shields fail.
The only thing that will make PDTs a wise choice is explosive damage being a threat again. Before 1.1 (?) reduced explosive damage, I ran a Viper with two point defense turrets because one of the only things I really feared was a volley of seekers or torpedoes from an Asp with four or six launchers.
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My problem with SCBs is not that they boost shields per se, there is a place for a module that helps speed up regeneration, it's that they do what they do far too well.
A single 3B SCB holds a total of 594 extra shield HP (as far as we know from testing). An Anaconda with a 7A shield generator has 595 shield HP. Any ship with a base shield value higher than 1 and a single class-3 internal slot to spare (such as the Viper, if we either ignore its small power plant or load it with multicannons) can have more total shield HP than an A-rated Anaconda would have without them. Overkill much?
An Anaconda loaded to the gills with B-rated SCBs can have 8,817 HP in the SCBs alone (though it's obviously going to have to cycle them to avoid melting its power plant). Throw in a 7A shield gen and a compliment of shield boosters and you can push its effective shield HP up to 10,364.
Now, as per this other testing thread, the highest shield-DPS weapon in the game is the C3 fixed beam laser at around 30 DPS. The most of these you can fit on one ship is 4, for around 120 DPS. So, an array of 4 C3 fixed beam lasers with unlimited energy and unlimited heat capacity (anyone who has used said beams knows how big of a handwave *that* is) would need 86.4 seconds to get through that much shield HP, assuming the constant damage prevents regeneration. That's almost a minute and a half. You could cut that down a bit by also tossing in C2 and C1 beam lasers in the Anaconda's medium/small hardpoints, but not by much.
If you really need that level of tanking ability, you should probably be asking for player-flyable capital ships. Those would actually cater more to that kind of playstyle.
They'd probably be much more reasonable if they were a steadier regen over time, able to be potentially outstripped by potential weapon DPS, rather than their current "health potion" behavior where, outside of synchronized ramming, they effectively function as a huge pool of extra HP.
A single 3B SCB holds a total of 594 extra shield HP (as far as we know from testing). An Anaconda with a 7A shield generator has 595 shield HP. Any ship with a base shield value higher than 1 and a single class-3 internal slot to spare (such as the Viper, if we either ignore its small power plant or load it with multicannons) can have more total shield HP than an A-rated Anaconda would have without them. Overkill much?
An Anaconda loaded to the gills with B-rated SCBs can have 8,817 HP in the SCBs alone (though it's obviously going to have to cycle them to avoid melting its power plant). Throw in a 7A shield gen and a compliment of shield boosters and you can push its effective shield HP up to 10,364.
Now, as per this other testing thread, the highest shield-DPS weapon in the game is the C3 fixed beam laser at around 30 DPS. The most of these you can fit on one ship is 4, for around 120 DPS. So, an array of 4 C3 fixed beam lasers with unlimited energy and unlimited heat capacity (anyone who has used said beams knows how big of a handwave *that* is) would need 86.4 seconds to get through that much shield HP, assuming the constant damage prevents regeneration. That's almost a minute and a half. You could cut that down a bit by also tossing in C2 and C1 beam lasers in the Anaconda's medium/small hardpoints, but not by much.
If you really need that level of tanking ability, you should probably be asking for player-flyable capital ships. Those would actually cater more to that kind of playstyle.
They'd probably be much more reasonable if they were a steadier regen over time, able to be potentially outstripped by potential weapon DPS, rather than their current "health potion" behavior where, outside of synchronized ramming, they effectively function as a huge pool of extra HP.
I now agree with your point on chaff. Your argument was solid.
I also agree that SCBs are the only thing that make big ships viable but I strongly feel it is the wrong fix. Better armor systems that allow for MUCH longer survival after shields went down and a component for a faster base recharge rate would be a better fix, as per ross's post below.
As for PDTs I always make my arguments based on the assumption that truly glaring holes in the balance will get fixed eventually. I feel that missiles are one such hole and assume (possibly incorrectly) that FD will eventually realize they made a horrible mistake and give them back at least part of their power. (then again SCBs have proven FD tries it's best to ignore it's mistakes)
NICE. I like that you did maths. Not sure about the exact numbers (can't annies hit 1000 in raw shield hp?) but the point made remains sound.
And yes steadier regen utility would be a much less gamebreaking way of making big ships more viable. (along with hull armor actually helping the powerplant and hull reinforcement packs being on top of all internal modules).
+1
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This is more an argument of how SCB are kind of just messing up the game than a solution to a problem.
Fighting an interdiction ought to have different risks than submitting. You've already admitted that you could escape interdiction reliably by submitting, but you don't seem to want to accept the consequences of fighting interdiction and failing.
You're claiming that even faced with a 4 man gank, SCBs allowy you to (essentailly) outlast interdiction after you fought it, but failed.
Considering the nature of interdiction in this game, the ganker/hunter/pirate is on a time limit to get the kill before the target 's, and SCBs excessively slow down kills to the point that 4 people (largest mechanics-supported group) might not be able to drop 1 target within the longest time-frame they can establish.
This is why the extended TTK of multi-fitting SCBs is a problem.
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50% of everything complained about is just crying that you weren't allowed to go brain dead while you mashed buttons to win (this specifically applies to any player saying that chaff isnt fair in pvp, I am pretty sure that constantly locking on to your target and holding down the fire button isnt how pvp was designed to be in this game), being consciously aware of your surroundings and constantly adapting is what makes competitive pvp games fun and this can be implemented without ruining the pve experience for people. I don't have a ton of experience dealing with SCBs but they do seem a bit ridiculous, its basically just having a mana shield while being able to chug a mana pot every time it gets low, there's no risk involved. To me there are a few pretty good solutions to this that could be implimented such as your shields increasing there energy output from having them drained and refilled constantly so that you would overheat from too many scbs eventually or just have it so that using an SCB increases the damage taken to the shield since the integrity of it would probably diminish from having a new battery thrown in without letting it properly recharge.
I would also like to say that coming up with a solution for SCBs in the way you play and the way you outfit is what a true competitive player would do, they adapt, constantly.
Last thing - there is no such thing as a griefer, PKer, or KOS players. If the game allows for it then I will not be bound by rules anyone makes up outside of the game, want to stop someone like that?
Then adapt and win.
Playing to Win — Sirlin.Net
Last last thing - A game that is designed well for pvp has an answer to everything, which this game so far seems to have, for example: trouble with SCBs? Well luckily there is a simple solution built in, a player must READ how much damage you will do to there shields and in how much time. "After using a Shield Cell Bank, it takes 5 Seconds (Kick-In-Time) until it starts recharging your Shields. If your Shields go down before it actually kicked in, the charge will not work, leaving you with stripped Shields." So alternate how quickly you take down there shields, have a weapon for sustained MJS and then 2 or 3 for bursting it down, its hard to read what you cant see comming.
As for chaff... learn to aim
Im gonna get wrecked for this post but whatever lol
I would also like to say that coming up with a solution for SCBs in the way you play and the way you outfit is what a true competitive player would do, they adapt, constantly.
Last thing - there is no such thing as a griefer, PKer, or KOS players. If the game allows for it then I will not be bound by rules anyone makes up outside of the game, want to stop someone like that?
Then adapt and win.
Playing to Win — Sirlin.Net
Last last thing - A game that is designed well for pvp has an answer to everything, which this game so far seems to have, for example: trouble with SCBs? Well luckily there is a simple solution built in, a player must READ how much damage you will do to there shields and in how much time. "After using a Shield Cell Bank, it takes 5 Seconds (Kick-In-Time) until it starts recharging your Shields. If your Shields go down before it actually kicked in, the charge will not work, leaving you with stripped Shields." So alternate how quickly you take down there shields, have a weapon for sustained MJS and then 2 or 3 for bursting it down, its hard to read what you cant see comming.
As for chaff... learn to aim
Im gonna get wrecked for this post but whatever lol
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On a power limited Vulture or FDL, I load two SCBs but have to have one turned off to hit the power limit.
Even though the SCB is turned off, it does not lose it charge. You can just turn it on (once you've used up the first SCB) and fire it immediately.
I think, that the SCBs should lose charge when turned off (maybe slowy), and then take time to charge back up when repowered.
That would make the SCBs more realistic and help limit the usefulness of carrying lots of SCB banks, as the power generation limit would limit the usefulness of many SCB banks at any one time.
Rob
Even though the SCB is turned off, it does not lose it charge. You can just turn it on (once you've used up the first SCB) and fire it immediately.
I think, that the SCBs should lose charge when turned off (maybe slowy), and then take time to charge back up when repowered.
That would make the SCBs more realistic and help limit the usefulness of carrying lots of SCB banks, as the power generation limit would limit the usefulness of many SCB banks at any one time.
Rob
Repped actually.
People who think SCBs are so overpowered haven't tried to counter them with fixed C3 beams hard enough or they can't aim/time that PA.
One cannot expect to drop players as fast as they drop NPCs.
If there's no solution to counter nuking (see HI-CZ and wing duels with focused dmg) then we have a nice Counter Strike game.
My Thoughts....
Is there an issue with the SCB's,: Yes, I believe they should be limited to 1 just like a lot of the other modules, this way you have to make a choice.
But what annoys me the most is the people complaining about it, (this weekend I saw a Lot of CMDR's spamming the comms window with their views etc.... don't get me wrong, everyone is entitled to their views etc... but when you start disrupting the games for others because they are not "playing" the way you want them to, it's gone to far!
You are not playing the game they way I want you to so it's broken FD has to fix it or I am not going to play anymore.
Fine then DON'T PLAY!
Some people need to grow up.
Is there an issue with the SCB's,: Yes, I believe they should be limited to 1 just like a lot of the other modules, this way you have to make a choice.
But what annoys me the most is the people complaining about it, (this weekend I saw a Lot of CMDR's spamming the comms window with their views etc.... don't get me wrong, everyone is entitled to their views etc... but when you start disrupting the games for others because they are not "playing" the way you want them to, it's gone to far!
You are not playing the game they way I want you to so it's broken FD has to fix it or I am not going to play anymore.
Fine then DON'T PLAY!
Some people need to grow up.
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I would rather say deselection is a workaround, and as workarounds typically go it is very awkward, because the players has to fight the UI. Either it is intended that deselection would render gimballed weapons fixed even when pointed at a target deploying chaff, in which case a much less awkward solution would indeed be a button to lock/unlock gimballed weapons in a fixed forward position (same button could also apply to turrets then, btw). Or this is not actually intended, and gimballed weapons are meant to move all over the place even when the ship deploying the chaff is not selected. But I cannot seriously regard deselection as an intended way to handle such a situation, but a mere workaround until FD get to implement something better.
Let me tell you as a Python owner myself, who has flown it into RES and CZ alike (with the rare random PvP encounter - I never actively seek PvP) that I do not enjoy at all the prospect of being required to chug shield potions back to back and run as soon as I run out of them. The problem is less the possiblity, for in PvE you can live without SCBs, or just one for absolute emergencies, but the fact that when you come upon a (PvP - because NPCs don't do that) opponent who does stack SCBs, you have already lost.
And to pre-emptively answer the question what I would do to prevent the much too swift destruction of big ships:
a) Decent shield regeneration that scales with the class and rating of the shield generator. I am thinking of 1 minute from shields failed to shields at 100%, on an Anaconda.
b) Shield toughness responding linearly with pips to SYS. At the moment, 1 pip basically is the same as 0, 2 hardly does anything at all, 3 is okay and at 4 suddenly you have decent protection. This shouldn't be an all-or-nothing affair, an Anaconda flying with 2 pips to shields should feel a significant boost to its shields toughness compared to one running with 0 pips.
c) Abolish power plant sniping. Depending on how small the "small chance" in 1.4 turns out to be, we may be getting that. Though how automatic the 50% power loss at 0% power plant health plays out in practice, especially without a sufficient number of power priorities to properly fine tune the precise 50% point to ensure maximum possible ship functionality (and not some broad "all weapons offline because that one laser in the one power priority for all weapons brought you to 51%).
d) Make armour tanking, both default and upgraded, and hull packages a worthwhile option. Armour should protect modules, too, and hull packages should increase module hitpoints as well. In my mind, a purely battle-focused Anaconda wouldn't be filled with a dozen SCBs, powering them on and off as they get depleted while the pilot consumes them non-stop. Instead, the ship would sport massive armour and hull reinforcement and could truly keep fighting long past the point when the shields have failed, and coupled with point a), would see its shields reinitialize over the course of such a fight, as opposed to the current situation where for anything Dropship and above, when the shields fail that's it for the entire remaining duration of almost any encounter.
(P.S.: SCBs were added way before the Vulture or FDL.)
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O no. My Asp can't take out a Python because of all the SCBs the Python can carry.
Problem or realistic?
I think it's realistic.
The OP is moaning because he lost. You got on his tail because you had a better turn rate, either because you used FAOff or because your ship was more nimble. The other pilot had a different tactic, pack in SCBs. The best pilot is the one that walks away not the one thats best at the tactic you choose to use.
Problem or realistic?
I think it's realistic.
The OP is moaning because he lost. You got on his tail because you had a better turn rate, either because you used FAOff or because your ship was more nimble. The other pilot had a different tactic, pack in SCBs. The best pilot is the one that walks away not the one thats best at the tactic you choose to use.
I dont believe that the current 'I load up my Anaconda with scores of Health Potions and beat anyone in PVP who doesnt do the same.. oh and my Anaconda charges its shields at the same rate as the Vulture too' is realistic at all.
I believe is SCB were limited to one per ship, shields charged at a rate relative to Powerplant / Capacitor / Shield module size.. then things would be better. Oh and of course Armour worked for modules as it should
The above would be more realistic.
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So how many Vultures should it take to kill an Anaconda? My opinion: One (don't be silly), Two (if they're very lucky), Three (if they're organised), Four (probably), Five (definately).
Taking away the skill of the pilot, how does the game mechanics make that ratio happen? SCBs is one of the ways.