Speed rebalanced

[doc]

http://myeve.eve-online.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=574

...

Speed Goals

Designing towards specific goals is a base tenet of game design; without goals there is not much to aim for. Yet, design goals can be very hard to put down on paper. Even with a room full of people where you’re sure everyone has the same basic vision, nailing a lengthy and lively brainstorm down in a clear and concise way can be like returning the toothpaste to the tube at the end of the day. That being said, this is what four of us came up with during the course of a mere five hour meeting on the current speed crisis:

* Speed must never reach ludicrous speed, which is defined as speeds where missiles and drones don't intercept the class of ship they were intended for.
* There should be a significant and meaningful difference in speed between the ship classes.
* Speed should not permit a larger ship to perform the role that a smaller specialized ship was intended for.
* Afterburners should be a viable module selection for PVP.
* Guerrilla warfare must remain a viable combat tactic.

...

I foresee a lot of tears.

[Shen]

Prepare ship for light speed.

No, no, no, light speed is too slow.

Light speed, too slow?

Yes, we're gonna have to go right to .....ludicrous speed.

[Fartman]

nanofags, meet nerfbat. nerfbat.. nanofags.

so i guess this is the death knell for Triumvirate MkII?

[Grunt]

Hmm, hard to say how bad it really is, will have to see on SiSi how fast ships can still go. Most nanogangs I was in were fine with the 3k to 5k ships. You don't need a 15kms vaga or a 20kms interceptor to do well. Handy, but not vital. So if ships still go 3kms to 5kms, I don't think nanos are really that nerfed.

[Yorda]

You didn't even get the good parts:

* Warp scramblers (the close range ones), are due for a complete
makeover. Our current idea is to have MWD's deactivate as soon as they
get hit by their effect, and continue to be disabled until the effect
is lifted.

* A brief reactivation delay added to the microwarpdrives might ensure
a speedy target actually slowed down, and of course with the MWD
disabled, a webifier would have an even greater effect.

* Our current idea is to have MWD's only differ in capacitor capacity
penalty as well as reactivation delay, instead of the speed
progression between meta levels.

* Currently when you're webbed it's pretty much game over unless
you're doing more DPS or have a better tank. The 90% speed reduction
makes combat too static and predictable when webifiers have been
applied. To address this, webifiers in our proposed changes have been
reduced in effectiveness down to between -50% and -60%.

* Nanofibers and polycarbon engine housings changed to affect maximum
velocity and agility (which is basically what they did before, through
mass reduction) would ensure balance, morphing them into a mixture of
overdrives and inertia stabilizers and thus stacking penalized against
those modules. Our current implementation makes 3 nanofibers
approximately as effective as 2 overdrives and 2 inertia stabilizers.
This means, if one would want to fit for maximum speed, go for
overdrives; maximum agility, fit inertia stabilizers; a bit of both,
use nanofibers.

* Polycarbon engine housings are overpowered, both in general and with
regard to corresponding modules; this is because the tech1 version is
currently more effective than a tech2 nanofiber. Following our changes
we're looking at them being 30% less effective than their module
counterparts, which is more similar to the difference between modules
and rigs in other categories.

* Our intent is to have overdrives range from approximately 7% to
12.5%; the high-grade snake set 24.7%; the low-grade snake set 16% and
the gang bonuses down to 25.8% but with an added agility bonus.

* Slot placement of other speed implants may shift

So minmatar are pretty much completely worthless now

[Viro Melchior]

I agree with Grunt. The fastest I've ever gone was a bit over 10km/s (in a frigate sized ship), as I've never well and truly nanofagged it.
And for the most part I stick to 2-4km/s ships for nano gangs. That's really all you need for avoiding BS gatecamps.

And the whole "but they'll catch my nanoship now" argument is kinda moot, since the opposing ships will go slower as well.
I do however agree that this is a serious nerf to Minmatar ships, as if CCP mess up (which is likely) they will not only slow down the *fast* ship setups, but they'll slow down the sane setups on other ships.

Thankfully for me, the only ship I particularly care about is my Kitsune, which I only run a single MWD and nanofiber II on anyhow. So I don't see this nerf affecting me too much, but for anyone that tries to get their ship able to hold a 2000+m/s orbit around a BS to avoid cruise missle rapage... well there goes using small ships to gank ratting Ravens.

[cosy]

time to train missiles skills and caldari ships .....

(this is a boost to caldari)


if that wanna nerf speed ok nerf polycarbons and put some mass on vaga etc
but this is a complete change on speed
other change leaded by the same dev grrrrrrrrrrrr

[Viro Melchior]

time to train missiles skills and caldari ships .....

(this is a boost to caldari)


if that wanna nerf speed ok nerf polycarbons and put some mass on vaga etc
but this is a complete change on speed
other change leaded by the same dev grrrrrrrrrrrr

I 2nd that. Nerf the polycarbons, and/or give a slight bump to the other "nano" rigs. Don't introduce more stacking penalties.

Only "good" thing in this balance issue is them taking a look at afterburners and PvP utility.

[doc]

time to train missiles skills and caldari ships .....

(this is a boost to caldari)

I hope that the new average speed will match the explosion velocity...

[Ebodhisatva]

nvm

[Carebear]

At last. Eve-o forum has 500dps Afterburner armour tanked vagabond setups posted so people will be heading back to sensible setups insted of a 4-8k/sec crap

[Bastables]

http://myeve.eve-online.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=574




I foresee a lot of tears.

What do you mean foresee? Within moments of this devblog popping up the caterwauling started

[esecer]

At last. Eve-o forum has 500dps Afterburner armour tanked vagabond setups posted so people will be heading back to sensible setups insted of a 4-8k/sec crap

No, they'll just fly the fully insurable Hurricanes that can do 700+dps

[Firelord]

It needed doing, ships that were untouchable because of there speed was unbalanced.

To be fair, getting into 7.5k is not going to be that easy with webby's only doing 50/60%.

With that change my pilgrim now stands a chance of getting out alive as it has to fight in overheated web range for its primary ecm to work.

Firelord

[wildcat84]

This had to happen. Don't know if I completely agree with how they are doing it though, seems to me that this is a HUGE boost to Caldari and Amarr, and a devastating nerf to Minmatar (speed was all they had) and Gallente (all their DPS ships are short range blaster boats).

I think they could have done it better. I'd have introduced hard caps on ship hulls instead of the radical changes to MWD's.

Warp scramblers are also going to be WAY overpowered because all you have to do is drop in ONE module and you can put 2 points on someone's warp ability, AND have a 100% chance to kill their MWD. Also I don't really like the webifier changes, since that is a module that cried out to be ENHANCED, not nerfed, to counter nanos...

What they should have done was introduce scripts for warp scrams and webifiers that let you choose to scramble MWD or WD, and to boost web range (at the expense of strength) or strength (at the expense of range).

Honestly, they could have fixed a lot of the nano problem with that alone.

[k]

This is the come back of WCS

[Viro Melchior]

Wildcat, I see the webifier nerf as a method to "weaken" the nerf to nanos. Webbers will be less effective, but ships won't be going as fast. So the webbers won't need to be as good to be balanced with their current level.

The problem there lies in the fact that velocity usually meant webbers were useless. To get one to work, you had to be able to stay close to your target, which usually meant that *you* had to be faster.

If it were up to me (and along CCP's current plan of attack), webbers would get cut in half, but with double the range (or more). That way in order to stop someone with webs, you need at least 3 (45%, 45%, 45% = total reduction of 83%, which is less than a single good webber does now). But if you just need to slow that 3k/s ship down, one web will drop them to 1500, and if you can tag them from 20+ km away, you can catch them in it even if they are faster than you. But one web wouldn't catch someone if they were significantly faster than you (over double your speed).
Agree/disagree?

Beyond that, I think the speed nerf is messed up. I'm a Caldari/Gallente pilot, with good speed skills and fly matar t2 frigates as well. So I'm looking at it from both sides. Just haven't flown a vaga.

[Yorda]

Warp scramblers are also going to be WAY overpowered because all you have to do is drop in ONE module and you can put 2 points on someone's warp ability, AND have a 100% chance to kill their MWD. Also I don't really like the webifier changes, since that is a module that cried out to be ENHANCED, not nerfed, to counter nanos...

Warp scram's range is really bad though, almost any nanoship is going to engage from 13-15km which is well outside of the scram range.

I don't really get the whole "they're untouchable and that's unfair" thing. Yea, they're untouchable at 7-10km/sec but they cant hit anything going that fast anyway (aside from nano-ishtars, sacs, and crows which if anything are getting BUFFED because of this). The only thing to counter them with is a faster nanoships, but how much of eve is like this? How do you kill dreads? more dreads. How do you kill battleship? more battleships (titans / carriers work too).

[Suitonia]

I'm going to abuse the new mechanics as much as I can with my Lachesis. I got a bunch of Domination scrams sitting around (22.5km scram range on the lach/arazu). With 3 RSD's thrown onto it I should be able to drop the majority of ships lock range below 22.5km.

[Torshin]

Warp scram's range is really bad though, almost any nanoship is going to engage from 13-15km which is well outside of the scram range.

I don't really get the whole "they're untouchable and that's unfair" thing. Yea, they're untouchable at 7-10km/sec but they cant hit anything going that fast anyway (aside from nano-ishtars, sacs, and crows which if anything are getting BUFFED because of this). The only thing to counter them with is a faster nanoships, but how much of eve is like this? How do you kill dreads? more dreads. How do you kill battleship? more battleships (titans / carriers work too).

nano-ships can choose if they want to engage or not, there is no risk involved in using one until you choose to fight.

[John Smith]

nano-ships can choose if they want to engage or not, there is no risk involved in using one until you choose to fight.

Back to the days of people seeing interceptors and then a whole fleet just turns around and goes the other way. yay!

[Yorda]

nano-ships can choose if they want to engage or not, there is no risk involved in using one until you choose to fight.

You could say the same of force recon ships, or hot dropping, but I don't see people complaining about them being overpowered.

[bobtheknob]

Because they are less prolific.

[Carebear]

You could say the same of force recon ships, or hot dropping, but I don't see people complaining about them being overpowered.

Hot dropping forces the hot dropper to commit to the fight. Hot drops can backfire and they do quite often.

Force recon also has to commit to the fight. It cannot run away if things goes bad unless the mark is a idiot or if the force recon is nanoed.

Nanoships do not have to commit, since they can leavy the battle in seconds if things turn sour.

Im glad they are nerfing the hell out of nanos. About time and now people will fly with tactics insted of "press mwd button"

[agesilaj]

So tri is disbanding again , soon?

[Viro Melchior]

So tri is disbanding again , soon?

<tinfoil>
This isn't a nano nerf. BoB were tired of listening to Tri on the forums, and got their Dev buddies to nerf Tri. It's about time someone beat the shit out of another dead horse.
</tinfoil>

[Vinata]

Keep the web effectiveness the same as it is now, but add some fall-off. It gives slower ships a chance to catch up by lowering the target's speed from further away, while still not being unfair to the webbed ship.