Capital Balance Thread #99 - An Issue of Scale

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
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TL;DR: Constant capital unbalance is a result of inconsistent progression from subcapitals to capitals. This improper progression includes follow-on effects that further widen the gap between the two ship categories. Overall, this makes balance between capitals and subcapitals almost arbitrary and extremely delicate at the same time.

Hello, welcome to another of the numerous capital-related posts here on the forums. Today I aim to to expand the conversation by bringing up a trend in ship balance that has been brought up once before, but I believe to be the core issue that needs further addressing. Also, work is slow today and the only real entertainment this computer has is Excel (yay…) so I did some math.

I won’t comment much on the upcoming changes as I’m sure there is plenty of speculation out there. That being said, while the focus of this post is to address the problem more than a particular solution, I will bring up some potential solutions to help illustrate my message.

So let’s get started…

Inconsistent Progression: ”THE GAP”

Some ship stats (HP/Damage/Capacitor/etc) do not progress consistently from subcapitals to capitals.

Here is where I believe it all begins. There are a few other possible culprits, but this one is particularly annoying in how it interacts with other factors. In 2015, before the major capital rebalance, a presentation was given that illustrated how vast a gap there was between capitals and subcapitals:

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This graph was given just after a slide promising a “Complete Rebalance of HP & and Damage”.

While I didn’t go so far as to calculate EHP, here is a graph showing the current raw HP comparisons in a similar manner:

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The overall EHP numbers have changed, but clearly it didn’t do much noticeable change for most people in the end.

Here is the difference in all average raw HP between the different classes by percentage increase from the previous tier.

*Notes:

  • Only includes T1 Empire ships (no faction or ORE)
  • Attack Battlecruisers excluded
  • Titans and Supercarriers (SC) are separately displayed for illustration.

image

There is quite a bit more detailed sheet I can share later if you’re interested.

While we don’t have much more than 6-9 classes to compare, it’s fairly obvious that somewhere between BS and Capital quite a few extra zeroes were added. Also note that when excluding carriers, the difference is somewhat greater as carriers typically have 25-33% less HP than Dread/FAX.

BS >> Carrier = +836%
BS >> Dread/FAX = +1296%

That first 1142% jump is exactly where I feel the problem lies. Whether it is the cause or the result of something else, you can see a similar trend across some other key stats as well. Capacitor pools experience a 978% increase across the same boundary. It is specifically because of this massive leap that the relationship of balancing capitals against each other AND balancing against subcaps is such a difficult task. Without making special cases and non-organic rules, one relationship is made healthy while the other is made sour.

Having looked at a number of ways to mix and match the classes together to see how different they are the biggest differences to be found are between the major ships classes: Frigate, Cruiser, and BS. The highest I could get without jumping more than 2 sizes up was the increase from FrigateDestroyer vs Cruiser/BC at 408%. Even in an odd comparison like that, we still have a situation where capitals are way over the trend in size.

To put in perspective, the relationship in HP between BS and capitals is closest to that of Frigates and Battlecruisers. Furthermore, if we look at some more extreme comparisons, we see how the gap has greater effects as progression distance increases:

Frigate >> BS = +1927%
BS >> SC = +4558%
BS >> Titan = +5909%

As you can see, this tier gap to supers is immense. Based on the progression trends of subcapitals, Capitals aren’t just a single step or two steps above BS. Capitals are entirely in their own realm of reference. The second order effects of extreme stats like capital HP also tend to be what either makes them seem broken or overpowered from the outside.

All that being said, there are some reasons why capitals have these stats and why they keep them. I’m not going to delve to much into the history of it. All that really needs to be said is that it all started around structures like POSes and then Sov and outposts. All of those systems have either radically changed or are shortly going to be removed. So the current state of capitals has some freedom to move where it needs to be without those considerations.

So what now? Do we even need to do anything at all?

With capitals so far removed from the rest of the ship tree, what to do about them basically boils down to what we want to do with them. They could easily remain in their current relative state or be victims of balance change.

It is my opinion that The Gap does needs to be dealt with. As it stands, the ship tree as a whole remains unhealthy so long as capitals remain so far toward the top.

In my view, We can no longer pretend capitals are rare or limited or that the proliferation of capitals can be reversed. We need to consider Capital balance With similar interaction considerations that we give to subcapitals. There need to be holes in capability that other ships can take advantage of with relative efficiency, especially in regards to how other capitals and BS can get involved. I’ll consider capitals to be in a healthy place when their relationship with other capitals and BS looks much more like that of any given Disposition of Cruisers, BCs, and BSs.

Sidenote: I have been referring to Capitals and Supercapitals simply combined as “Capitals”. This next part, when I reference Capitals, I am no longer including Supercapitals.

There are numerous options to accomplish a better ecosystem. I’ll list a few of my favorites here with some explanation. I won’t go into great detail at the moment.

  • Option #1: Closing The Gap
  • Option #2: Filling The Gap

Option #1: Closing The Gap

This one is pretty straightforward: Nerf the â– â– â– â–  out of Capitals and Supers until the gap is no longer out of line with normal progression.

This method will likely take multiple passes to get right. Bring down/up the most extreme stats incrementally until they reach an acceptable level of relative power and vulnerability to one another. Admittedly it’s a bit of an arbitrary balance point, but I think it can be hammered out well enough given a much closer relationship between Caps/Supers and subcapitals.

It may one day reach a point where Supercaps sit just above where capitals today are in terms of power.

Option #2: Filling The Gap

While this option won’t be entirely without nerfs to supercaps, it will focus much more heavily on regular Capitals and new ships.

Some of the roles currently filled by capitals will require somewhat of a split, similar to the separation of some carrier roles into FAX. This method may also see some existing ships reclassified into a tier higher or lower.

For example, let’s look at the combat dps line and dreadnoughts. Right now the biggest thing keeping dreadnoughts closer to subcapitals is siege. Without the penalty against remote assistance, dreadnoughts would be oppressively powerful over subcaps and even capitals in some cases. Siege essentially removes scaling as a factor in tank and logistics. You have a theoretical maximum tank and that’s it. Fleet composition will not change this. At the same time, it also makes them very vulnerable to Supercapitals, as that theoretical maximum is fairly easily reached without having the siege penalty.

One possibility to fill the gaps properly is to split dreadnoughts into two ships that fill the roles currently filled by one ship. Again, looking at subcap relationships for inspiration, the new dreadnoughts could have similar functions as destroyers and BCs do in their respective environments. One could be set at a tier or two lower and focus its strengths toward capital engagement. The other kept where it is or moved up one, while focusing its strengths toward subcapitals. It could even be reversed, whichever has better gameplay implications. Since they are both focused in a single direction rather than trying to stretch both ways, balance restrictions like siege may not be necessary in all cases which would allow a more complex environment.

The same idea also applies to FAX. One ship with a focus on capital needs, and another focusing on subcapitals needs. Both not needing triage to be the sole anchoring point for their strengths and weaknesses. One thing to consider as well, wherever the ships are split or moved, the resulting role doesn’t necessarily need to be covered by a single ship in that position anymore. If FAX were split into capital and subcapital focused versions, the capital focused ship doesn’t need to have the same rep output as its previously larger version achieved. If three can do the same job as one did before then all that’s left to look at is whether or not it’s resources (build costs) or logistical strains (can it fit in an SMA?) are and adjust accordingly.

For carriers it wouldn’t be as simple. Right now, supercarriers are more or less much better carriers by most significant measures. It may be more practical to just make sure that these two ships don’t overlap in capabilities too much as they do now.

Again, the above options aren’t the only choices available. However I do see it as very necessary for a healthy ship tree to either close the gap from the top or fill it in from the middle. The sudden gap in progression and power is just to large to ignore.

In Closing…

While the debate has spun around on its wheels on a number of ways to deal with capitals and supers, I don’t hear this massive gap being addressed as an issue often. While I may have written this piece almost entirely on raw HP numbers, Don’t forget that it also includes other factors as well, including things like damage and capacitor.

I strongly believe that this gap remains the core issue behind all of the other problems we see regarding the position of capitals in New Eden. If it is not addressed, the issues plaguing players and developers are just going to become much more prevalent and painful.

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A good post.
I feel you have neglected a significant base ehp on Battleships as a partial solution though. There would be room for them to grow via certain mechanics while keeping dps and tank similar.
For example, a role bonus on bc of tank modules give 50%more hp, on bs of 100% more, and an ehp buff for bs on their base hull as well.
That BC to BS gap is the smallest single tier in subcaps and does explain why BS struggle in the meta. So that gap could certainly be stretched.

Yes this wouldn’t solve everything but it would be a step along the path also.

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I’m not entirely on board with trying to move subcaps up in power too much. It could be a solution, but I see it more as just shifting the gap elsewhere. When you buff BS to fill the gap, you run the risk of increasing the gap between the lower tiers by as much (if not more noticeably) as it went up.

Not entirely against the idea, but I would see any buffs given to BS to be the result of another ship being placed directly above BS. Since BS have rarely (if ever) been balanced against something bigger than themselves like other ships deal with.

I won’t say BS couldn’t use some love to give them some more life, but I tend to find that as an issue derived from them being the top of the bottom of the food chain. Right now, any capital with downward project (carriers/HAW) are basically ships that are multiple tiers up, who’s only acceptable targets are BS. It’s be like if someone built BCs/BSs with the inherent ability to have great effect on Frigates with nothing in between to act a kind of buffer. BS right now are figuratively the whipping post of Eve’s more punishing mechanics and ship balance fulcrums.

To be a bit fair (since I didn’t include the entire messy sheet I created), the BC to BS jump is very close to the same as the Frigate to Destroyer jump (79% and 69% respectively).

It’s also kind of the reason I excluded Attack BCs from the chart because they essentially are much closer to Cruisers in some stats than they are BCs and that would have greatly skewed the numbers for an outlier. Once I can nail down a good way to compare weapon sizes in conjunction with hull sizes it might make a bit more sense.

That being said, that kind of difference does also give us a good reference of what a BS+ tier of ships would look like.

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It is, but then what is the DPS gap between those two classes. Destroyers get a lot more than an EHP jump. If BS got a similar dps jump as the frigate to destroyer step, the ehp step would be acceptable. But… well they don’t.

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I actually just reread my post there and I might be a little blind (the part I was referenceing was right there).

I’m trying to find a decent way to compare relative damage between weapon systems, but it’s going to be an extremely broad scope as so many different things come into play that can make a trend look uneven when it really isn’t.

This is especially difficult since all capitals that use guns also have ridiculous bonuses for them to make it work.

My suspicion is that dps changes also won’t show the whole picture, as ships like destroyers and BCs have native application bonuses that set them apart from cruisers and Frigates, while their damage bonuses don’t change much.

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I agree with your suspicion really, but I think you’ll find that dps at least also doesn’t give a flattering view for battleships. I’m sure some other comparisons could be run as well, and a few might land in the battleships favour, but I expect most will show Battleships aren’t where they should be at the moment. There has been power creep below them and they haven’t received any.

Yes Capitals still have an issue and there isn’t room for another sub class without stepping on battleship toes too hard, but the closer battleships are to start with the less capitals will need changing so the less screaming we will get

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To define the problem
To define the solution
To Implement the solution

These are the steps to change.

What is the problem with capitals?

  • Economic income rates are insanely high

    • This suggests nerfs to the income rates, but that would equal to changes to pve, since nerfing the combat abilities would result in ineffective capitals.

  • The population is growing into capital only population

    • This is largely due to the fact that capitals perform better vs subcapitals and have better income rates

Thus the solution is

  • Redesign capitals to fight their own sizes, or larger (supercaps) but not be able to target lower (preventing income capital to sub capital ratting)
  • Create capital encounters (combat sites) for capital (player) to capital (npc) battles this could even be done with team work involved for better social interaction

these two changes would balance isk gain rates, validate subcapitals, and would stabilize their income. They have the least effect on the game and the greatest effect of balance

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Ratting aside, I disagree that capitals and supers should be segregated entirely like this. As stopgaps and temporary measures maybe, but a good solution should include a relatively healthy interaction between all classes, not just amongst a class itself. That kind of environment also opens up numerous options to deal with capitals without even having to specifically design the counters in.

I’m not opposed to this. It’s honestly something I had been hoping for since they released NPC Capitals. We already have content for smaller ships based on size, it’s not a stretch to give bigger toys some room to play as well.

Also, in reference to the income generation point:

I don’t believe that income generation is the root cause of the capital problem, more like something that has amplified it. Excessive income and capitals wouldn’t be a problem if capitals were actually worthless. They’re just so strong at the moment that a major part of that extra income is being funneled straight to capitals.

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This change would require ccp to do something it has never done, a massive rework of eve, and i dont find that merited at this point. This would be a highly inefficient use of development resources.

What is more problematic behind this is that people advocating for this position, are what i group into the “dying breed of gamers”, which appeal to “1 shot the noob” , “I should get an omg super op ship because i played long” or “games should be highly complex so i can find ways to invest my time in finding ways to break the game giving me a big advantage”. All of these ultimately equate to “egotism”, which is not health and needs to be blopped out of the game, much less the industry (thankfully most of us senior designers are intelligent enough to know not to do what ccp and others like them are doing).

This point is one of the 3 reasons why ccp has, and will never acquire 1m+ online, it is a point that screams ignorance on the part of the UX designers and CEO of CCP.

That being said, I have to ask with the above in mind, Why do you think capitals and sub-capitals should interact in this manner? How do you defeat the “snowball” effect that comes largely in eve?

In the early days, frigates countered battleships, and that provided a massive balance in eve, however, now, it is very much not the case. The game has gone fully int snowball, egotism, and i personally dont think they will be removed until the ceo of ccp is either fired, resigns, or negates his position (and i find the latter to be unlikely).

To the point about balance in this case now.

I think we are approaching capitals in the wrong way. I would like to see them side by side, not interacting, but providing a purpose to the larger mission. I also think that even should look at moving capitals in to cap battles, or cap-station interactions.

In the flip side, non-capital class ships should a similar changes to stations. this provides an instant balance for capitals, purpose to them, an emotional admiration for what they do as a subcap player, and helps keep the balance. I would also advocate that sealth ships would be the only ships to target capitals, providing them a unique benefit over other non-subcaps, and helping push stealth ships into a more sov-oriented role. Imo, the stealth ships need more power in terms of the way they mechanically interact with them game (the best being a cloakable station)

These changes would more importantly have a significant impact on the pvp in eve. They would help turn subcapital battles in null into roam/camps, and capitals to structure fights. This would allow capitals to be less slave related to their job in an alliance and help boost pvp interaction on a subcapital level. Also, this would help make new players more valid in the mix, further increasing pvp.

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It is to a degree, but the multiboxing significantly increases that. This is because ratting, as someone so intelligently said, needs to be redesigned, with more interaction and danger.

It is because of the way combat works with player/environment interaction that eve suffers from multiboxing. CCP is lacking a good UX designer imo.

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Egotism is never going away, that is well outside the scope of what a game designer does.

Furthermore, the rest of the paragraph implies I want capitals to remain as strong as they are or be stronger. This hardly aligns with my suggestion of draconian nerfs to capital stats which would have the opposite effect.

Mostly because it’s a somewhat arbitrary disctinction that does not follow consistently with the pattern set by the majority of ships and classes in Eve.

This belief is also based on the assumption that a significant reduction of power in capitals means they would be much less of a problem to deal with by other classes of ships. It’s the same as how the circumstances for smaller ships to deal with bigger ships (and vice versa) are much broader than the relationship that capitals have with subcaps. Capitals have many specialized options to deal with capitals but subcapitals do not necessarily have the same resources to work upwards.

That’s not really the case. If anything, todays frigates have many more tools to work against larger ships than they did before. However, that still ignores that frigates countering battleships was and is situational. It’s not accurate to say one class is a counter to another. There are situations where one class can take on the other.

And here is my inherent problem. Forcefully preventing interaction like you’ve suggested, not just for a modules or specific ship against other specific cases, inherently means that the class is not balanced and is wholely against against how eve works in its most basic sense. There is no reason a capital, supercapital, battleship, or even a hauler couldn’t kill a Frigate given the right circumstances. This restriction is used sparingly in order to ensure that players have freedom to play as many ways as possible. It becomes the responsibility of a designer to make more options, and make sure each option is sound enough to not be the only option to consider. The fact is, even under current circumstances, there are conditions which can lead to healthy and fun interaction between capitals and subcapitals. The problem is, this conditions are too narrow. Removing them entirely is a net negative in terms of creative and play style possibilities.

Not to put a straw man up, but this very much implies that neither ship class would have any place in the other’s sphere. You may as well play two different games at that point.

Also, I’m going to ask the obvious: how does decreasing the interactions between ships, increase PvP? There is little reason to believe that a carrier’s ability to kill Subs has any kind of impact on my decision to fight a subcap gang that has no caps. And again, preventing interaction between major classes like that is awfully lazy balance, and hardly even counts as balance considering that balance implies interaction. Removing interaction means there is nothing to balance.

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An excellent post. I have been advocating for splitting dreads into two separate classes of ships since before CCP added FAXs.

I could see CCP keeping current dreads largely as-is: high EHP platforms intended primarily for static fights. I would change their bonuses to be primarily defensive in nature though.

A second class of combat capital ships could exist somewhere between battleships and dreadnaughts: capital ships with jump drives and access to capital modules (and requiring the same Dreadnaught skill to operate), but with lower base EHP, no siege modules, and balanced more around mobile, high DPS combat. As a role bonus for these new platforms, I’d give them all +100% damage to HAW turrets (assuming the HAW nerf goes through) to maintain their viability against subcaps, but with their reduced EHP they’d still require logistics support in order to not be easily overwhelmed.

While I don’t think that this change alone would address the gap you bring up, it would help fill it, and also diversify gameplay somewhat.

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Why exactly is this gap in health an issue and why do you think this gap needs to be closed?

Is it impossible for the game to be balanced when a type of ship exists that has so much health that it requires a fleet of smaller ships to kill it?

Sure, capital ships are different than sub-capitals. But it’s not just the HP that makes the gap from battleships to capitals different than the gap of frigates to destroyers, it’s the complete package of capital ships being different. Capital ships (can) travel using a jump drive, are too big for certain stations and areas of space and they have massive amounts of health.

I see you coming up with multiple solutions, but what exactly is the problem you’re trying to solve? I may not fly any capitals myself, but I don’t see why this health gap is an issue.

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Specifically it makes other things necessary like increased damage, capacitor, repairs, to even approach a sense of balance within the class itself. A fleet of supers where each ship only has damage in progression with the tiers below would be a nightmare. Imagine two fleets of Abbadons, Rattlesnakes, or Damnations having to engage each other with Frigate-sized weaponry. It would take magnitudes more time for the fight to progress, if either side could even secure a kill on the other.

The arbitrary level of hp and damage means little by itself. I’ll explain later.

That’s not the point to look at here. Simply needing more of a smaller ship to engage larger ships is something that exists already in the subcapital. This trend will exist so long as we have a variety of ship classes and sizes. How much is needed is something to look at, but not a wholly significant factor on its own.

It’s not a matter of simply having the stats. It’s the relative differences that make the size differences mean something. That sudden gap is what makes and equally sized fleet of capitals or supers feel so much more oppressive than a fleet of battleships.

If we look to subcapitals as a reference, there are clearly many reasons why BS aren’t always the go-to ship for any engagement. Other ships, especially cruisers and BC, have relatively close enough attributes in any given area that makes the engagement much more complex, less predictable, and ultimately more fun and engaging.

Unfortunately, as I illustrated before, capitals and supers lack this kind of competition. The overall gap between BS and Capitals/Supers means that the larger ships have much less competition. Lack of competition is what makes any dominance they have at any given time seem that much more oppressive.

For example, if we were to delete all ships between frigates and BC (excluding their support), there would be a clear and obvious choice for the vast majority of engagements. Frigates may hold the advantage of maneuver, but BCs would always hold the objective in any given position.

And remember it’s not just hp. HP is where I see the largest gap. Other stats also have gaps well beyond the normal trend, but in my view, it boils down to a chicken and egg argument as to which stat holds the most blame.

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That is actually not the case at all. In design we appeal to emotional aspects of players, in fact, if we do not its bad design and will likely influence the retention values of a game.

CCP directly supports and encourages this type of behavior, only because the ccp thinks its good, when its not, demonstrated by the declining population rates.

Capitals should be in their own class, doing different things the subcapitals. They should not be able to target capitals, and potentially, sub-capitals should not be able to target them (with the exception of stealth ships). This is the most healthy solution to the" capital ships" issue.

Another alt, really?

No, removing their ability to target subcaps is not nerfing them. Its putting them in another bracket, ergo, your claim of reducing power is not valid, since their states were not even touched in that process to start with.

what ccp is doing now is “nerfing” them.

Listen,

Capitals being in the same category, able to interact with sub-capitals, will always result in the capitals being the “best ships” since they are significantly more powerful. Until capitals are removed from the competitive scene, to a cooperative one, the result will always be “capital spam”. They need to move into their own bracket, built on killing structures, and other capitals, or providing logistical value.

Ccp’s designers are subpar, slow, and generally do not make good choices. at one point ccp had a few intelligent designers, but they are long gone, which is why ccp is hurting so bad.

This can be proven by the many points from eve’s history, or by the many points that ccp has not even touched.

Repeating yourself. Yes, It was stated clearly, They should not interact in means of combat directly between each other (capital and subcapital).

That is not another game, that is another aspect of playing. Your trying to argue that playing subcaptials at that point is like playing mario. Its total insanity.

ITs clear you want to roflpwn noobs.

From this point on ill just start looking at “posts” made, and ignoring anything under a value. Im tired of your alt spam for attention.

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  1. accusing rowells of alt spam really is paranoid.

  2. If Capitals and sub caps can’t interact if I bring 1 capital and you have zero I win every structure bash. Because I am literally immune to you.
    Can you not see how bad an idea this is

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Your giving good design a lot of credit here. You’re
not controlling a players’ mental state. Ego influences a lot of things that would otherwise not be a rational case to have ego.

Subscription rates have a lot of factors that influence them. Pointing to anything specific as a cause really needs more than correlative evidence. By the same measure you could say an improved NPE is at fault for falling subscriptions as well.

That would be extremely game-breaking and entirely unprecedented. The idea that a handful of capitals is immune to practically any number of subcapitals is specifically worse than the status quo today.

What?

Im not going to get semantically about whether or not “can’t target a subcap” counts as a stat or not, but you do realize that the whole point I’ve been arguing has been the skewed inability for subcapitals to deal with capitals? The kind of change you suggest is just hard-coding that imbalance, and essentially rendering any non-capital ship useless in a fairly significant aspect of PvP. It even further would strengthen the idea that subcapitals have no use and generally makes a sour experience for the vast majority of players.

No, that is not true. Freighters, Bowheads, and Orcas are all capitals. Does that mean everyone uses them exclusively? No, there are cases where those ships are not sufficient or unnecessary. Furthermore, each of those ships have roles they can’t fill.

Also, your argument implies that being the bigger ship is what makes it better. And over the years, there are innumerable examples of why that statement isn’t accurate. I struggle to recall a time where T1 BS were considered too powerful. At best, pirate BS were/are fairly strong, but not because they’re bigger.

However, if I were to boost the stats of BS to just below capital levels, then I bet that would change a lot of opinions.

Removed from the competition? What?

I find myself doing that a lot here for some reason…

Maybe that wording wasn’t the best, but it holds merit. Pick any game in a recurring series (Civilization, Total War, Halo, Call of Duty, etc.) and you’ll notice that it doesn’t take much to make a game separate. Small mechanics changes, visual updates, none of those aren’t something that couldn’t be added to augment an existing game. But I can’t go back to an older version of the game and use an OP aspect of it to play with someone’s more recent game.

Putting a hard mechanical wall between capitals and subs is really heavily leaning in that same direction.

And considering that my subcap fleet can’t interact with a capital fleet, can we really say we’re playing the same game if we can’t play together?

You really think that a capital/supercap fleet is just a bunch of noobs? Or that anything short of gutting capitals will make it super easy to deal with them?

You could nuke the ehp of supers by %50 and subcaps would hardly even notice a difference of difficulty.

Oh that’s what you’re on about. FYI I have not posted on any alts. I’m not sure why you think I have either.

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Not actually the case, it is our position as designer to intentionally play with the emotional and psychological states of play for example, the choice between a safe road that is a longer way to town, or transiting across the forest with mobs in it, which is faster, but less safe.

Actually its not really game break. though it is a big shift in the dynamics of capital, and subcapital interaction.

This would result in capitals needing to be protected, no more booting afk goon titan - gate guards. you could offset the inability to target the subcapitals with smartbomb, or indirect forms of damage. If anything the recent destruction of super cap drops and smart bombs was validated by the north walking all over the goons invading fleets two weeks ago.

They are best out of each other meta’s, working side by side. we’ve played the game of small changes to the capital and subcapital system to balance them over the years, its not working. time to make another change.

Allowing stealth ships to target capitals out side of the no-interaction policy would be a mechanic that indirectly validates them. this helps further their ability to do unique things in eve.

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You’ve given a player two choices, now what?

From what? Subcaps can’t hurt you, and subcaps can’t hurt other capitals. Capitals are already built around each other with a semblance of balance, so that’s nothing new.

That’s a super-pathetic counter to anything of serious threat. Unless you’re a titan and can just boson anything that looks at you funny. Which, in my opinion, is already a bit much.

I’m honestly not sure what you’re saying here, nor which specific fights you’re referring to.

Yes, but if they can’t interact, how can they work side by side? There’s little that a capital needs a subcapital for, if it doesn’t have to worry about subs itself. Caps could essentially play sov and structure warfare by themselves without anything to worry about.

Ok, and here is where two glaring issues come up.

Firstly, as I’ve described above, capitals already have immense HP pools to contend with, along with incredible repairs to match. You’re better off using capitals to try and kill your enemy as those are more effective counters.

You haven’t help make covops ships do more unique things, you’ve just made all other options impossible. Covops are already very valid in their own rights.

Secondly, you seem to keep missing the real reason you think they need to be separate. So far your reasoning has essentially boiled down to the name “capital” and then work from there.

Capitals aren’t really that different from any other ship in the game when you look at their different aspects. They have some unique features (as do many subcaps) but the biggest difference has always been scale. Capitals have always been treated as special, and that’s the problem. They aren’t viewed under the same lens as the rest of EVE, so of course they’ll be out of proportion.

You can clone any subcap you want and label it a capital. That’s all that is. The game only cares: “Is the ship a capital? Y/N” and then one of like 3 things happens.

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these are examples. Some players will choose the short dangerous, risky way, and others th save, longer route. its an example of good design, involved with emotion or psychological position. all good designers design in this manner.

i think you misunderstood. I am ok with subcapitals targeting capitals, but i perfer they do not target capitals. Even if they do, the cloak-ops ships are dangerous, and will need subs to protect them.

have you not seen what happen to goon pets recently with the northern invasion? do not underestimate smartbomb super-cap fleets.

Whats super-pathetic is playing a game of blow up the noobs with my super-spam. as ccp stupiditly try to carry on with mindless stat-tweaks, t hy just dont get the point, that they wont work in balancing the older population with the new. Players must stay competitive, and there is nothing competitive about the egotistical position of slaughter the noob with the ship that cant be killed by them.

not true, they have to worry about subcapitals targeting them, or some subcapitals targeting them. in either situation they can be threaten’d more. Thus, subcapitals threatening them results in them needed to be protected by other subcapital fleets, while they do sov war. capitals do not worry about subcaps now because they slaughter them not because they are out side of each others gameplay objectives.

Imo, capitals should be used for anti-capital, and anti-station reasons. Out side of this, im ok with them being used for capital to capital level of rat encounters (new types of combat sites that help balance the isk income rates instead of nerfing the respawn rates. it is not fun for players to wait around to do things, so lower income rates at steady over time values ie better, thus capital player to capital npc rates is a good option for balance).

Out side of this, the capitals should not be able to do anything (unless they are mining etc based) in pvp.

Some times limiting access to things helps diversify a class. I could make the argument that cloaks fall under the same design mentality.

Yes they are. They can move systems with out gates, they have insane hp values, they can also move others from one system to another. Subcapitals generally cannot do that (except black-ops ships).