I like that one! I'll steal it for later... (perfect description for me!)
Hot take on Ship Health and TTK
- Thread starter Alexander_Sepulveda
- Start date
No, I don't want my trade ships' shields to be nerfed so that PvP builds can explode them even faster. I'm always being told not to fly paper ships; I don't.
Edit: the basic dilemma is this. All anti-gank strategies hinge on escaping as quickly as possible, and that time is limited by FSD cool-down and charge time, which is fixed. Either shields last that long, or they don't. Reducing shield strength in any way has the same effect on this situation as giving gankers more DPS; surely that's obviously a bad idea to everyone except gankers!
Edit: the basic dilemma is this. All anti-gank strategies hinge on escaping as quickly as possible, and that time is limited by FSD cool-down and charge time, which is fixed. Either shields last that long, or they don't. Reducing shield strength in any way has the same effect on this situation as giving gankers more DPS; surely that's obviously a bad idea to everyone except gankers!
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i don't think the "sofa dwellers" part is very fortunate. it's not ill intended but can easily be called out as derogative, or even be interpreted as a snipe at consoles ... you know forum minefields. use at your own risk!
I think the main problem is shield boosters. In particular, heavy duty shield boosters.
We can stack 8 boosters on top of reinforced shields, but we have no equivalent "damage booster" to stack on engineered weapons. It''s not that weapons need a huge buff as they currently do decent damage to hull/modules, but he disparity between shield strength and weapon damage is too great.
Heavy duty shield boosters need a nerf, especially to the stacking effects. One heavy duty booster on a small combat ship isn't the problem. Seven or eight on a Cutter is.
We can stack 8 boosters on top of reinforced shields, but we have no equivalent "damage booster" to stack on engineered weapons. It''s not that weapons need a huge buff as they currently do decent damage to hull/modules, but he disparity between shield strength and weapon damage is too great.
Heavy duty shield boosters need a nerf, especially to the stacking effects. One heavy duty booster on a small combat ship isn't the problem. Seven or eight on a Cutter is.
Yeah I remember these times. IMO the best it could get was 2.0 Horizons. Granted, the SR railspam meta wasn't exactly the most balanced (and surprise surprise, it was a FDL that was the meta) but atleast you could nuke stuff when you got a good position for proper ToT before your target could wake. Any pilot error would be punished instantly and you couldn't ram 10 asteorids, tank multiple salvos of PAs and enduring the heat of a sun for 20 minutes straight.
The point made about a universal shield nerf that inadvertently hits shielded traders the hardest is a point worth considering. To alleviate this potential problem, i would suggest that all HD shield boosters consume power proportional to their % of shield increase (which is much more than current). Also, and importantly, allow shield boosters to be mounted on weapon hardpoints. So you want to fly an indestructible trader? Fine. Crank up that power plant and store the weapons. Honestly traders being indestructible isn't the problem. Its combat ships that have massively bloated hitpoints without sacrificing any firepower to get it. Engineering has allowed combat ships to maximize for both variables with the ludicrous power output possibly and modest power consumption increases from shield/weapons blueprints. I think players should have to choose to maximize offense, OR defense OR attempt to strike a balance that suits their needs.
To be fair, PVErs are expected to grind thousands of ships for things like the current community goal. This is an MMO and FD want us grinding because it's a timesink. Having to head back for repairs after every single fight would be fine if the format of the game was entirely different.
CQC?
Would be nice to have faster and more destructive ship to ship fights.
If this would be a pure combat game.
But this is not. And when a murder boat meets a non combat ship, the fight tend to finish really fast
(talking about pvp, but it's the same when my g5 vette drops on a poor t6 trader in a nav beacon)
That's on you.
Try to fly something smaller, like a DBS, from time to time. Or even an Eagle.
Well, in the last Sirius Combat CG, my epic alt got 75 millions in a Krait mk2 with G3 shields and G4 mc+rails. Some fights were kinda tight. And it was certainly more fun than playing a Vette on the other 2 accounts.
The problem with these changes is they affect everyone.
And the very vast majority of commanders are rather... unskilled... when it comes to combat.
So the changes will actually impair their general ability to survive against NPC way before those changes will make the combat challenging for a commander with good combat skills.
Yeah, totally agree
I'd imagine that the optimal solution would be to base shield booster power consumption on shield power consumption. Doesn't make any sense that I can get 23 MJ from 1.2 MW on an Eagle, or 700 on a Cutter for the same amount <I picked those numbers randomly without checking, sue me>
What if a booster that provides 20% shield costs 20% shield generator power, or alternatively a % of gen power times the ships shield multiplier stat, and any engineering that affects boost affects the power as well? You'd certainly have much more balanced gameplay between haulers and gankers, if that's the concern...?!? If the % of power scaling were chosen carefully, such that maxing out enforced a sacrifice of weaponry, you'd have your balanced gameplay at least against giant shield stacks in PvP. Only concern I have there is the efficient weapon mod.
Without constraints on power and heat, we can simply pick the most power hungry items without penalty.
Deminishing returns of shield boosters
But: Increased recharge and rebuild rate and increased maneuverability of large ships - base value thrusters grant a bit more speed and turning.
Smaller numbers that recharge faster will reward staying on target, while better maneuverability will not let this become a direct nerf of large ships
But: Increased recharge and rebuild rate and increased maneuverability of large ships - base value thrusters grant a bit more speed and turning.
Smaller numbers that recharge faster will reward staying on target, while better maneuverability will not let this become a direct nerf of large ships
Well, there it is. AFAIK Cutters aren't popular PvP ships, so what you're suggesting isn't intended for making PvP more fun. It's intended to make my trade Cutter with its multiple boosters easier to explode. No thanks.
There's no way round this. Reducing TTK across the board in any way is a disaster for Open play. It doesn't matter whether you do it by halving shields or doubling DPS, the effects will be the same: more use of Solo and PG, more blocking and more clogging. Is that really what anyone wants?
As much as I’d love to see a better balance between ships and builds, I can’t disagree with this. I don’t really have a dog in this fight as a mostly Solo/PG player anyway, and I build my ships how I likes them and how I think they should behave, so I don’t have room for loads of magic shield boosters on my big ship because I wanted masses of PDT so I could watch the light show as they shoot down missiles, limpets and mines. A little restraint in PvE builds goes a long way, and pretty much any reasonable loadout can be effective if it’s applied right. The level of danger seems to be just about right for me, but I’d humbly put myself somewhere on the lower-middle end of the skill curve.
Well, I take a look at my Cutter and it's effective raw shield of 15k mj and think what gameplay loop is ever going to touch that? I do think shield values are on the side of being too high.
However, that stable door is already open, the horse has gone and has already made foals with the mares next door. To take these values and say they're going to be reduced is a difficult thing to manage, especially after having the current system for so long. It's like asking for drive or FSD engineering to nerfed so g5 would be the equivalent of g3. That certainly wouldn't be well received.
As mentioned previously though, shield values don't matter. It's possible to run CZs in a 300 mj Chieftain and win the battle without the shields ever dropping so a reduction in shield values by whatever method wouldn't actually solve anything anyway.
In fact, you're right in that changing anything to make things harder at this stage just means players who previously could do something now can't. We only need to look at the comments about credit earnings when supply and demand was correctly implemented on mined commodities to see how that will go. I'm not saying anything about people being wrong or right here, just what will happen if you make a big number smaller.
So, my TL;DR on this is I personally think ships are too tough, but trying to change things with an engineering system has been constant for 3 years doesn't make sense.
The only thing I see if FDev wanted to do something (and that is up to them) is adding new opt in content to challenge those builds, but leaving everything current as it is.
Wow! Even I can't get it that high with GSRP in every slot and every utility filled with SB's... (well, not RAW shields)
But thank you for offering an illustration why such debates are entirely pointless, it isn't unexpected.
Ah, I misspoke there- absolute, not raw.
I think a lot of these debates are heavy on changes and requests, but rather light on exactly how we'd all benefit. This for example would make no difference to some and likely be a negative change for many others. I'm sure there's other things that would give a more positive benefit that could be worked on.
Three or four of the current top5 gankers in the CG use Cutters, ya know?
Cutter is the most used big ship for PvP/Ganking, because it has an absurd amount of shields and can reverski most ships.
No problem - I did wonder.
These 'debates' generally follow the same format - in PvP it is boring trying to deplete the health pool of an equal build - so to make PvP 'interesting' the range of options for everyone should be restricted, be it shields, armour, weapons, synth types... As long as the PvP player is able to benefit the rest of the playerbase wouldn't notice the difference we are told.
It has ever been thus since I joined the forum, it is unlikely to change unless the game changes, and if the game does change to favour what is essentially a minority of players and an entirely optional playstyle it may not be the wisest move Frontier have ever made. Think about it
Reverski is wonderful... Fly away from a ship that is flying away from you...
Ah, OK, I didn't know that, I thought FdL was the meta.
It still is, for mostly the same reason, biggest shield strength in it's class combined with above average speed/maneuverabilty and high dps.