The SCB (Shield Cell Bank) Thread

[CMDR Byr Goefin]

Thanks! Ignore the PM I've sent to you RE This as this explains it perfectly

So in simple terms, if you ram someone, damage is done to both of you, and that damage is either to shields (if they're up) or hull. If it's to shields, the more pips you have the more that reduces it.

I assume the "super" 4-pip mechanics are still in place? <-- Never quite understood the magic effect of pips to shields myself.

Putting the marker down now that people calling for SCB nerf will be back asking for SCB buff once Frag cannon ammo quantity buff and 50% ammo buff synthesis takes effect in Horizons.

 

[Watcher]

Perhaps I don't spend enough time in combat I don't see the problem with SCBs as is.
They cost you money, weight and heat, take some amount of timing to get right and stop you from equipping other things you might find useful to bring along.
This is fine isn't it?..
Someone might be able to survive longer or possibly get away from a fight they don't want but isn't that the point - people can equip their ships differently and play differently?

 

[nicemoreoften]

You can build your ship for hours of swimming in an RES, or you can build your ship for punching straight through SCBs. Don't do the former, then complain that it's taking forever.

In 2.0, I have 1 7b SCB (6a shield with 3 boosters) and 1 4b but still can survive for quite a while and punch through other Clippers easily. SCBs are very buffed protection-wise but the 7 shoots my heat up to 120% from 30% and the 4 shoots it to 90%.

 

[CMDR Kantos Kan]

Speaking of which, I'm disappointed with the fix that Frontier decided to have in the upcoming 1.5/2.0 versions. Instead of tackling the stacking of SCBs, they punish all players. Everybody now has to carry a heat sink launcher and it still doesn't prevent SCBs stacking. Sigh...

 

[Psycho Romeo]

Speaking of which, I'm disappointed with the fix that Frontier decided to have in the upcoming 1.5/2.0 versions. Instead of tackling the stacking of SCBs, they punish all players. Everybody now has to carry a heat sink launcher and it still doesn't prevent SCBs stacking. Sigh...

I don't see how you could possibly think this is true unless you've never actually used an SCB. This isn't really true at all - unless you're running more than half your hard points as beams, you're barely going to go over 100% heat.

 

[CMDR Kantos Kan]

I have 3 large gimbaled beams on my Python plus 2 medium gimbaled pulse. I already need to shift one pip from WEP to SYS at some point. Now, if I have to fire a shield cell, I need to fire a heat sink too. Meanwhile, there are still other Pythons and Anacondas that have banks over banks of SCBs. That's my point.

 

[Psycho Romeo]

I have 3 large gimbaled beams on my Python plus 2 medium gimbaled pulse. I already need to shift one pip from WEP to SYS at some point. Now, if I have to fire a shield cell, I need to fire a heat sink too. Meanwhile, there are still other Pythons and Anacondas that have banks over banks of SCBs. That's my point.

I don't really get your point. You're running under a huge thermal load and complaining that an SCB sends you over the edge. This is like me running three PAs and complaining that an AFMU makes me run out of power.

 

[tawittle]

Surprised to see this thread is still around.

Well now that we've all had time to test out the 1.5 changes, I think every PVPer has come to the same set of conclusions:

1)HRP are now far better than SCB on virtually every ship
2)the 20 second boot-up and extra heat makes SCB stacking completely worthless
3)the FDL is far superior to any other ship

I don't agree with the new hull tanking meta. Power management is no longer an important skill, and it's far harder to die in combat.

I'm expecting to fight in and against FDLs exclusively in 1.5.

 

[NeilF]

Surprised to see this thread is still around.

Well now that we've all had time to test out the 1.5 changes, I think every PVPer has come to the same set of conclusions:

1)HRP are now far better than SCB on virtually every ship
2)the 20 second boot-up and extra heat makes SCB stacking completely worthless
3)the FDL is far superior to any other ship

I don't agree with the new hull tanking meta. Power management is no longer an important skill, and it's far harder to die in combat.

I'm expecting to fight in and against FDLs exclusively in 1.5.

...and I still think if SCBs had just been limited to X uses in X minutes... done... (eg: 3 charges could be used - using 1 to as many SCBs as you like - within any 9 minute period)... But heyho...

 

[aRtFuL]

I have 3 large gimbaled beams on my Python plus 2 medium gimbaled pulse. I already need to shift one pip from WEP to SYS at some point. Now, if I have to fire a shield cell, I need to fire a heat sink too. Meanwhile, there are still other Pythons and Anacondas that have banks over banks of SCBs. That's my point.

You are running a bad setup and complaining about SCB's heat? seriously...

3 large Beams is such a waste of hardpoints for one. Also, you won't be able to spam SCB in the next patch anyways.

 

[CMDR Kantos Kan]

I don't really get your point. You're running under a huge thermal load and complaining that an SCB sends you over the edge. This is like me running three PAs and complaining that an AFMU makes me run out of power.

When putting only 3 pips in WEP, right now in the current 1.4.01 version, I can still fire *all* my weapons and fire a shield cell if need be. Yes, there is thermal overload. Now, in the beta, I overheat. That's my point. Instead of specifically addressing the SCBs stacking, Frontier is punishing all players. I have only one bank of shield cells. Just for emergency, or "last resort", like Sandro or Michael said they were for.

 

[Psycho Romeo]

When putting only 3 pips in WEP, right now in the current 1.4.01 version, I can still fire *all* my weapons and fire a shield cell if need be. Yes, there is thermal overload. Now, in the beta, I overheat. That's my point. Instead of specifically addressing the SCBs stacking, Frontier is punishing all players. I have only one bank of shield cells. Just for emergency, or "last resort", like Sandro or Michael said they were for.

Um, not all players run three large beam pythons and not all players have your particular issue so therefore not all players are punished like you think they are. SCB heat is VERY manageable, without heat sinks.

This seems so obvious that I feel like I'm missing something.

 

[KellyR]

You are running a bad setup and complaining about SCB's heat? seriously...

3 large Beams is such a waste of hardpoints for one. Also, you won't be able to spam SCB in the next patch anyways.

Wasteful? Those 3 large beams eat shields for breakfast. And they enjoy dining on hull too.

 

[clinton]

Shield cells over class 4 have been buffed in the 2.0 beta, over 400% in the class 8 case.

I'd hardly call that a nerf.

Here's a graph, with 1.4 strengths in Blue, 2.0 Beta in Red, and what I think they should be in Green.

And here's the numbers.

Class (A rated)	Cells	1.4 Per Cell	1.4 Total	2.0 Per Cell	2.0 Total	Clinton's Per Cell	Clinton's Total
1	3	70	210	25	75	25	75
2	4	105	420	52	208	50	200
3	4	135	540	91	364	90	360
4	4	160	640	157	628	135	540
5	4	185	740	248	992	185	740
6	5	205	1025	352	1760	205	1025
7	5	225	1125	653	3265	340	1700
8	5	245	1225	1128	5640	500	2500

 

[Mr. Bridger]

Perhaps I don't spend enough time in combat I don't see the problem with SCBs as is.
They cost you money, weight and heat, take some amount of timing to get right and stop you from equipping other things you might find useful to bring along.
This is fine isn't it?..
Someone might be able to survive longer or possibly get away from a fight they don't want but isn't that the point - people can equip their ships differently and play differently?

+1 for this. Trouble is there are always a bunch of people who think it makes them look cool and clever to knock part of a game. You wanna try playing BF4, jeeze, half the weapons are not cool and you get a load of grief from the 'look how good I am using a pea shooter while blindfolded' crowd if you use them.

 

[Jesse30]

My take on this new change, even though the SCB are better for the bigger ships and not so good for the smaller ships, I see lot of varieties in load-outs now vs the old SCB meta where we had everybody and their mamma used the same formula to win. I say the fights got a lot more interesting. See below

[video=youtube;gGJ8zQbya8E]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGJ8zQbya8E[/video]

 

[pkrdimos]

I think the over heat is a bad idea the way it is implemented. I can see making heat sinks more useful lessen the amount of shield boosters carried and other general game play ideas thrown into that but it could be way more balanced!!! 130% on an idle 32% python???

Just a balancing idea here that can make things even more strategic. Add excess shield charge (passed through an algorithm) to heat.

Example:

You have 1000 shields, take 500 damage.
One SCB can recharge 600.
Take 50% of the extra 100 and add it to heat (Just a not thought out idea. Can be a whole algorithm calculating the heat)

That way the effect of not being able to activate multiple SCBs, having to use heat sinks and much else is still there.

Just food for thought though. Maybe it will turn out better the way it is done now? We'll have to see!

 

[CMDR Byr Goefin]

The tears are delicious!

 

[QuantumHD]

For me it is dreadful. I am not really a PVP player but I like PVE. I just loved flying in conflict zones but now if 5 ships attack me which happens if you are not careful and fly into a wrong place, they can take down your shields and then your hull pretty quick. The only way for me to escape in the emergency situation is to launch SCB but now it overheats the ship so much that It damages my ship. And let's just say that you are still fighting in the conflict zone, I attack a ship and at the same time 2 others are attacking me. I use my chaff but it is only temporary cause another chaff loads very slow. So to counter those 2 ships that I can't attack cause my attention is on the other ship, i used SCB to counter them. And to be honest with the old configuration of SCB Heat system when I attacked anaconda or let's say a python ship in CF If I was not careful about my SCB deployment this ship could take my shields down so I was either forced to fight or escape. Sometimes with slower ships like python I was not able to escape a good couple of times. Ok I can agree that for PVP this change can make sense I see that. But I am not a PVP player and fighting in conflict zones that I loved is absolutely destroyed now.

So now it is like this:
- I can do 500k with trading, and this is a very safe way of making money. No big deal
- I can barely do 150k in conflict zones cause my shields go down very fast and I can't counter ships that I can't attack at the moment for some reason. Using SCB is very risky, they might be boosted but they damage my ship too much.
- Previously I could seat for a while and actually make some money in CF. But if I made mistakes cause I was too greedy or something, my shields even with SCB could be taken down easily. Using SCB in wrong time could be deadly and It was deadly for me many many times.

TLDR; So yeah PVP i understand the change. But at the same time you destroyed it for PVE players.

 

[Nugstar]

This is simply not true.

I'm not sure what ship you're flying, but scbs are effective if you use heatsinks.

Try popping a heat sink, wait 2 seconds then fire your SCB. You shouldn't take any damage.