Why do all the PVP builds I see posted not use shields?

[Majinvash]

Welcome to the Buff/Nerf roundabout that balancing for PvP provides. Please enjoy your time spent splitting hairs and repeating the word Meta until it looses all meaning. Once a player comes up with a build that convinces players that it has an advantage, boom, a shift will come. No one wants to feel like they are less that competitive, that is the basis for FotM builds and their proliferation. FD should just build their game, add the equipment they think is fun and fits into the world they are creating, and never ever look at threads calling for balance.

Well if NPC's were even a slight challenge maybe this would be relevant to PVE players as well.
But they are not, so it isn't.

Majinvash
The Voice of Open

 

[tawittle]

Welcome to the Buff/Nerf roundabout that balancing for PvP provides. Please enjoy your time spent splitting hairs and repeating the word Meta until it looses all meaning. Once a player comes up with a build that convinces players that it has an advantage, boom, a shift will come. No one wants to feel like they are less that competitive, that is the basis for FotM builds and their proliferation. FD should just build their game, add the equipment they think is fun and fits into the world they are creating, and never ever look at threads calling for balance.

I don't know why people say stuff like this. Any competitive game goes through changes as it evolves. You say, "FD should just build their game" but everything FD has done indicates that they DON'T read the forums and they DON'T care about the competitive pvp scene and they ARE developing the game consistent with their '84 vision. 2.0 made pvp worse, objectively. It's not like pvpers were asking for the HRP changes. Funny enough, it was mainly PVE players getting "ganked" who were crying and crying about the SCB, and probably the only reason why FD buffed the HRP. IF you ever read threads about pvp you'd know FD doesn't give a rat's behind about their competitive scene and that's why so many pvp player groups/players have quit over the past months. (including the most infamous...the code)

 

[Alexander the Grape]

Their place is PvE, its a thread about PvP, if you use turrets in a 1v1 I guarantee you will lose, if you use gimbals you will lose vs anyone semi-competent or better. (which your video is proof of btw )

Turrets hard counter any build that has less than a certain threshhold of HP/DPS lower than you (unless they're running full chaff).

A turreted cutter cannot lose against anything other than another cutter, anaconda, or corvette in a 1v1

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Welcome to the Buff/Nerf roundabout that balancing for PvP provides. Please enjoy your time spent splitting hairs and repeating the word Meta until it looses all meaning. Once a player comes up with a build that convinces players that it has an advantage, boom, a shift will come. No one wants to feel like they are less that competitive, that is the basis for FotM builds and their proliferation. FD should just build their game, add the equipment they think is fun and fits into the world they are creating, and never ever look at threads calling for balance.

I guess that wing of ships running the exact same loadout going almost completely undefeated for 5 consecutive games against the best PvP groups out there was just a "flavour of the month"

This isn't a matter of culture, this is a matter of some things being mathematically OP

 

[Bran Tse Mallory]

Somebody must have put something in my Tea... I find myself agreeing with Majinvash more and more.

 

[Mohrgan]

None of that changes the fact that this thread in of itself proves my point. SCB's get changed because of player complaints. A new Meta arises, as they always do, and those that don;t favor that style start to crank the siren. And on it goes. The PvP players never get the balance they seek, and everyone else has to wait and see what part of their load out has changed. My point isn't even against PvP, it's the fact that with so many personalities, and opinions balance can never be reached, especially if you ask players, who will inevitably call for changes that benefit themselves. It happens in every game that feels compelled to balance via the forums.

 

[Majinvash]

Somebody must have put something in my Tea... I find myself agreeing with Majinvash more and more.

*High Five*

People just aren't ready for my Trews!



Majinvash
The Voice of Open

 

[Philip Coutts]

I don't think the thread is talking about balance. I think the point really is that for PvP a lot of players are using the same 2 or 3 ships with the same 2 or 3 load outs. Now that is to a point inevitable (unless Frontier keep adding more and more powerful ships / weapons) as people find out the most potent builds. If for example you watched any of the excellent PvP league a lot of the builds were similar and the tactics were similar. Is this necessarily a bad thing? If everyone is using the same build theoretically the winner will be the most skilled pilot.

 

[Mohrgan]

<snip>


I guess that wing of ships running the exact same loadout going almost completely undefeated for 5 consecutive games against the best PvP groups out there was just a "flavour of the month"

This isn't a matter of culture, this is a matter of some things being mathematically OP

I missed the matches, but you are just making my point. Your teammates and your build will now be the benchmark, if changes to balance were to come that shift would change your build. If you prove successful with that build boom, new Meta that everyone will flock to. It's not just about the success of a build, it's the way people flock to what seems successful, and the way that new optimum comes under fire. Sometimes just because it's so popular. It's all about why things become Meta.

 

[Alexander the Grape]

None of that changes the fact that this thread in of itself proves my point. SCB's get changed because of player complaints. A new Meta arises, as they always do, and those that don;t favor that style start to crank the siren. And on it goes. The PvP players never get the balance they seek, and everyone else has to wait and see what part of their load out has changed. My point isn't even against PvP, it's the fact that with so many personalities, and opinions balance can never be reached, especially if you ask players, who will inevitably call for changes that benefit themselves. It happens in every game that feels compelled to balance via the forums.

This meta isn't around because SCBs are undepowered. If anything, SCBs are stronger than before on the 1.4-dominant ships.

This meta evolved because of

a) heatsink buff (implemented to satisfy those who wanted to be able to use SCBs more)

b) FDL buff

c) Synthesis allowing for rail-spam

d) HRP buff

SCBs were NOT nerfed. They were made more complicated, more powerful, and more situational rather than the catch-all module for dominance.

The issue this meta has is that medium silent runners have no counter, not that SCBs are too weak.

The smart move would simply be to buff small ship's flight models so they could act as a counterbalance to stealth FDLs/FASes by being too small and agile to hit with kinetics or thermal/kinetics, while able to get close enough to nullify the stealth

That and nerf railguns or synthesis. When people are putting a class 2 weapon on a class 4 slot, you know something's up...

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I don't think the thread is talking about balance. I think the point really is that for PvP a lot of players are using the same 2 or 3 ships with the same 2 or 3 load outs. Now that is to a point inevitable (unless Frontier keep adding more and more powerful ships / weapons) as people find out the most potent builds. If for example you watched any of the excellent PvP league a lot of the builds were similar and the tactics were similar. Is this necessarily a bad thing? If everyone is using the same build theoretically the winner will be the most skilled pilot.

Skill is one thing, but skills are diverse. This meta is unfortunate in that it crowds out some skills in favour of others by cutting down on ship variety.

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I missed the matches, but you are just making my point. Your teammates and your build will now be the benchmark, if changes to balance were to come that shift would change your build. If you prove successful with that build boom, new Meta that everyone will flock to. It's not just about the success of a build, it's the way people flock to what seems successful, and the way that new optimum comes under fire. Sometimes just because it's so popular. It's all about why things become Meta.

It is possible to have more than one build being viable in PvP. There should be a diverse range of options and counters and interplaying factors, not just one overwhelming strategy

 

[Mohrgan]

This meta isn't around because SCBs are undepowered. If anything, SCBs are stronger than before on the 1.4-dominant ships.

This meta evolved because of

a) heatsink buff (implemented to satisfy those who wanted to be able to use SCBs more)

b) FDL buff

c) Synthesis allowing for rail-spam

d) HRP buff

SCBs were NOT nerfed. They were made more complicated, more powerful, and more situational rather than the catch-all module for dominance.

The issue this meta has is that medium silent runners have no counter, not that SCBs are too weak.

The smart move would simply be to buff small ship's flight models so they could act as a counterbalance to stealth FDLs/FASes by being too small and agile to hit with kinetics or thermal/kinetics, while able to get close enough to nullify the stealth

That and nerf railguns or synthesis. When people are putting a class 2 weapon on a class 4 slot, you know something's up...

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Skill is one thing, but skills are diverse. This meta is unfortunate in that it crowds out some skills in favour of others by cutting down on ship variety.

There you go. One opinion why this, and one opinion why that. It just ends up in a never ending cycle. Your opinion on what is happening is different from someone else. To satisfy both views you need to balance on two scales, then three and so on. It doesn't matter why people feel that changes should happen, it just matters that someone else will come with an argument to change things again. The Buff/Nerf cycle is born.

 

[DragoonKnight]

I dunno folks - I hope they keep stealth viable for the long run. It's a lot more fun than scb fests. You really get a kick out of watching two condas scb spam against each other?

You get all these posts about titfor tat flying styles and FD is tempted to spend too much time fixing a problem that's only a problem for a segment of the community.

Fighting stealth wings is fun. Flying in stealth wings is fun. It needs to stay, and it's sad it doesn't work well against AI. Yes, it's admittedly easy to stack hrps on small ships which gives them some advantage with the flat rate hrps. But I love the fact that I'm fighting vipers and cobras and dbs's instead of just a bunch of tired old condas and pythons spamming scbs. Small, fast, and hard to track ships should be dangerous. If a good wing of hrp'd stealth DBS's make my vette run - awesome! I should've not been an idiot and instead mounted a grade sensors, and turrets in conjunction with fixed. It's boring to just fight the same big ships. The new mechanics are downright fun and combat, if anything, is more varied.

And the claim that folks are using hrps because they can't use SCB's properly is humorous. There's little challenge in timing, and even less in switching. May as well contend managing heat while silent is mind boggling if that's going to be a real argument.

Shield builds still do great. And people are finally figuring out how to track silent builds and invest in sensors. It's a fine learning curve addition.

FD should be working on fixing/ improving the soul of the game (and the bugs of the game) instead of falling into the titfor tat balance debate.

A fight between 2 similarly equipped Condas or Corvettes should take a while. These are huge ships which can take a beating and if there is some SCB spam or HRP stacking then I dont see a problem. These ships give up speed and agility for firepower and the ability to survive a beating.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

Somebody must have put something in my Tea... I find myself agreeing with Majinvash more and more.

you shouldn't consume the Tea you find in those crashed T9's at the other end of the galaxy.

The smart move would simply be to buff small ship's flight models so they could act as a counterbalance to stealth FDLs/FASes by being too small and agile to hit with kinetics or thermal/kinetics, while able to get close enough to nullify the stealth

Well, this is again a lack of actualy proper abstraction of a RL model, What would happen in RL when this occurs? I would invent a fire and forget like projetcile that rams itself into an opponent and acts as a beacon, DONE; no stealthing anymore once this object is marked. The counter would simply be something like that, or a heat emitting device I just slap onto/into such a ship. Still a weird system that a ship can still fly because trusters themselves would leave enough signatures ot track such an object.

A fight between 2 similarly equipped Condas or Corvettes should take a while. These are huge ships which can take a beating and if there is some SCB spam or HRP stacking then I dont see a problem. These ships give up speed and agility for firepower and the ability to survive a beating.

SOME -yes. but the issue is the imbalance betwen those coming with combat equip vs those without.
As always, battle is about taking damage doing damage or avoiding damage. Nothing else. and a ship using any internal for NOT combat will be able to receive less damage and probably if this internal consumes energy also put out less damage. When a SCB of class 8 can swallow over 6k damage thats clearly FAR off from balance when one with and one without happen to meet each other. The only true option for the one with less is to run. Stealth is just the other counter of avoiding damage. But there is no counter for stealth, aside being able to tank such large amounts of damage that the stealthing one runs out of heatsinks. But both are extreme builds due to how stacking works. And anything inbetween is inferior thats the cause of the imbalance. But stuff inbetween should also work properly as a possible mix.

 

[Derath]

Turrets hard counter any build that has less than a certain threshhold of HP/DPS lower than you (unless they're running full chaff).

A turreted cutter cannot lose against anything other than another cutter, anaconda, or corvette in a 1v1

Turrets don't have 100% uptime, then they also don't fire at certain angles, don't make any use of reasonable pips management, are completely countered by chaff, silent running, aren't accurate and are the exact opposite of bursty.

Hp/DPS only is relevant in situations where two people are facing each other firing, all you have to do to beat an all turrets cutter is joust with beams, your damage efficiency will be 4-5x theirs and you can probably go down to a vulture before it actually becomes comparable again. 42dps/2600mj shield for a cutter btw, 107.3 / 1000 for a beam FDL actually puts them on par anyway.

Not including the fact you can use chaff to completely invalidate their weaponry for extended periods of time even if you don't feel like having any piloting input.

If your flying all turrets in PvP you are flying a coffin

 

[TheoZ]

This meta isn't around because SCBs are undepowered. If anything, SCBs are stronger than before on the 1.4-dominant ships.

SCBs were NOT nerfed. They were made more complicated, more powerful, and more situational rather than the catch-all module for dominance.

wowowo, hold your horses here Alexander the Grape. You don't consider the delay switching from shield cell bank set to the next one a nerf? Ofc it is a nerf, since before, you could change sets and use new sets instantly, while now, this 15-20 seconds (whatever) delay, makes the shielded ship MOSTLY vulnerable !!!



but I'd add again the "bug" concerning targeting in wings a silent running ship, contributing to the whole messy silent running op-ness situation.
I agree though with the rest of the points you made

 

[Majinvash]

I missed the matches, but you are just making my point. Your teammates and your build will now be the benchmark, if changes to balance were to come that shift would change your build. If you prove successful with that build boom, new Meta that everyone will flock to. It's not just about the success of a build, it's the way people flock to what seems successful, and the way that new optimum comes under fire. Sometimes just because it's so popular.

So wrong, so so wrong!

Pre HRP/Silent running, SCB/Heat changes with the last patch, we would fight BBFA, ROA, Triadus, TOC, SDC most nights.

You would see in a fight and being of use

Condas
Pythons
Clippers
Couriers
FDLs
FAS
Vultures
Vipers
Cobras
DBS

Now

Cutter
Corvette
FAS
FDL
( Maybe a clipper Apart from Kinmob, I don't think I know many who would use one. )

The Larger ships rarely last that long and then it descends into chase, nibble, chase, nibble, high wake signature.

The Vulture, a PURE fighter is all but useless in the current meta game.

Majinvash
The Voice of Open

 

[tawittle]

None of that changes the fact that this thread in of itself proves my point. SCB's get changed because of player complaints. A new Meta arises, as they always do, and those that don;t favor that style start to crank the siren. And on it goes. The PvP players never get the balance they seek, and everyone else has to wait and see what part of their load out has changed. My point isn't even against PvP, it's the fact that with so many personalities, and opinions balance can never be reached, especially if you ask players, who will inevitably call for changes that benefit themselves. It happens in every game that feels compelled to balance via the forums.

Yes people will always be arguing about pvp in Elite: Dangerous. I agree with that. I don't agree at all with what you said earlier that this buff/nerfing is somehow the result of the userbase, as in the players have invented something OP, and then cried about it, so that FD has had to balance the game.

That is not how game balance works. That is not how FD operates.

FD likely changed the SCB balance because they themselves thought it was broken. Perhaps one of the Devs tried to interdict a python in his anaconda and was utterly ticked off trying to break those 1.4 python shields and decided to buff hrp in 2.0. Maybe the devs just did some basic math and realized they made SCB way too strong in comparison to HRP. But to think the Devs read a thread on the forums and thought, "gee, we better buff HRP in the next patch for our playerbase!" I'm sorry, but it's just not true. It's flattering, because we all like to think FD cares about us, but it's just not true.

Anyways, people like to think hull tanking is some new OP thing, but they don't even realize the whole picture.

IN A 1V1 SHIELDED BUILDS HAVE AN ADVANTAGE. Most serious PVP'ers have silent running builds because they are anticipating teamfights, not duels. Really, a so-called "multi-purpose" build should BEAT a pure hull tanking build in a 1v1. This balance was clearly put into the game intentionally by FD, to try to help mobius/PVE players, who have always perceived that they have somehow been at a disadvantage in their builds. But of course the PVE'ers don't realize this, think they have to go hull tank to win any sort of pvp fight, and then come to the forums to cry about pvp balance while calling themselves "experienced pvpers".

The point I'm making is that the playerbase is utterly clueless when it comes to balance changes. The thought a small minority of players posting on a dead forum is driving the game balance is laughable.

 

[TheoZ]

So wrong, so so wrong!

Pre HRP/Silent running, SCB/Heat changes with the last patch, we would fight BBFA, ROA, Triadus, TOC, SDC most nights.

You would see in a fight and being of use

Condas
Pythons
Clippers
Couriers
FDLs
FAS
Vultures
Vipers
Cobras
DBS

Now

Cutter
Corvette
FAS
FDL
( Maybe a clipper Apart from Kinmob, I don't think I know many who would use one. )

The Larger ships rarely last that long and then it descends into chase, nibble, chase, nibble, high wake signature.

The Vulture, a PURE fighter is all but useless in the current meta game.

Majinvash
The Voice of Open

Totally agree here. That's how it is indeed!

And now that I am thinking about it, back then, you couldn't take the condas shields out in like 3-5 secs (with 3-4 ships, unless really close so you would have max damage output etc etc etc), but that's not the case even in prismatic corvette or cutter....get a wing of 3-4 FDLs with rails/plasmas and there you go...If defending commander is not carefull for 1-2 secs, kaboom!!!!

 

[Derath]

You would see in a fight and being of use

Condas
Pythons
Clippers
Couriers
FDLs
FAS
Vultures
Vipers
Cobras
DBS

Part of the problem with that isn't the HRP/SR or SCB/Heat changes though, its that the buffed FDL and FAS invalidate all the combat ships before them, the FDL and FAS are both better than the pre-nerf python and thats saying something. (or its close, god I miss that ship)

 

[Mohrgan]

So wrong, so so wrong!

Pre HRP/Silent running, SCB/Heat changes with the last patch, we would fight BBFA, ROA, Triadus, TOC, SDC most nights.

You would see in a fight and being of use

Condas
Pythons
Clippers
Couriers
FDLs
FAS
Vultures
Vipers
Cobras
DBS

Now

Cutter
Corvette
FAS
FDL
( Maybe a clipper Apart from Kinmob, I don't think I know many who would use one. )

The Larger ships rarely last that long and then it descends into chase, nibble, chase, nibble, high wake signature.

The Vulture, a PURE fighter is all but useless in the current meta game.

Majinvash
The Voice of Open

I think you are arguing my point. Before the change there were many ships viable because they could all cram in SCB's. Now with a big meta shift to SR/HRP's you see less overall combinations. A change in balance resulted in a change to balance, which manifested into an even more distinct meta, because of the up-roar of SCB's as king of PvP. For me, I just hate to see the swings in practical builds because of a mobs view of balance.

Opinions abound, reacting to them is the problem.

 

[Alexander the Grape]

There you go. One opinion why this, and one opinion why that. It just ends up in a never ending cycle. Your opinion on what is happening is different from someone else. To satisfy both views you need to balance on two scales, then three and so on. It doesn't matter why people feel that changes should happen, it just matters that someone else will come with an argument to change things again. The Buff/Nerf cycle is born.

Just because there's differing views, doesn't mean everyone's wrong. I actually have evidence to back up my views.

Take the FDL for instance, and compare the SCB performance of the FDL in 1.4 and 1.5.

in 1.4, a typical FDL build would look something like this: http://coriolis.io/outfit/fer_de_la...60404000000025j455e5466.AwRhrSutjo==.Aw18aQ==

Total shield strength: 550

Total recharge capacity(in 1.4): 1942

Now let's look at a shield focused build in 1.5: http://coriolis.io/outfit/fer_de_la...60404040400025j455e5466.AwRhrSuriA==.Aw18aQ==

Total shield strength: 707

Total recharge capacity: 1950

The power issues of needing multiple SCBs powered at once and the cost of having a utility slot as a heatsink is neatly solved by the additional power from the FDL buff, acting as a perfect testcase as to if the change in the meta is down to weak SCBs or other issues.

So here is a clear case where the previously dominant SCBs are not affected in the slightest, or even strengthened. If the issue was down to weak SCBs, this build would surely be omnipresent?

However, this build is incredibly rare compared to rail-spam silent running options.

This is due to the strength of the new build, not the weakness of the old: the old build has gotten stronger.​

The lack of diversity in the current meta is down to the strength and lack of counter of silent running FDLs and FASes, and the weakness of small ships.


Let's look at all current top tier PvP-viable ships:

FDL

FAS

Corvette

Cutter

Anaconda


The balance between these ships is exquisite, with all having a specific use, weak points and strong point. Here are the non-PvP viable/outclassed combat specialists:

FGS (Outclassed by Python)

Vulture (strictly worse than FAS)

Courier (strictly worse than FDL)

DBS (strictly worse than FDL)

Viper IV (Strictly worse than FDL)

Viper III (Strictly worse than FDL)

Asp Scout (would be viable but for massive hitbox and 2 utility slots)

Imp Eagle (outclassed by FDL)

Eagle (almost good enough flight model to be viable: too weak due to lack of internals and slow top speed)

Notice anything? All of them apart from the FGS (which will benefit greatly from SLFs) are *small* ships.

If small ships could outfly the FDL and FAS, this meta would solve itself.

I don't even think the FAS or FDL should be nerfed (maybe revert the FDL's flight model changes but that's it).

What's needed is for fighters to be strong and useful, with an actual utility role.

Oh, and nerf railguns