Caps and super caps

[Clary_Daemon]

From reading dev blogs, it appears ccp wants to limit big ships.
I think that’s a bad idea. The first day I came to eve, I determined that I would be an Avatar pilot at some point.
Since then I’ve gotten comfortable with a nidhoggur and rorqual.
Then I see some changes to mining and ratting that take away from the glory of being a capital pilot.

Big ships take a hell of a lot of investment. They should be encouraged, as all the noteworthy battles involve them, and it takes a lot to build them.
Please stop making big ships irrelevant. Encourage large ships.
They should be hard to beat, and very good at killing. Otherwise, why invest so much into them?

[Destiny_Corrupted]

@Clary_Daemon

From reading dev blogs, it appears ccp wants to limit big ships.

It’s good to know that the good folks at CCP have finally read the book I sent them almost a decade ago:

[Scoots_Choco]

@Clary_Daemon

From reading dev blogs, it appears ccp wants to limit big ships.

I have no idea where you’re coming up with this.

@Clary_Daemon

Then I see some changes to mining and ratting that take away from the glory of being a capital pilot.

Your idea of “glory” coming from using a titan to just rat? What?

[Shipwreck_Jones]

Well, they have to balance the game for everyone, no matter their play style or time spent playing Eve. Capitals are expensive investments (in terms of both isk and training time), so they have to have qualities that make them worth flying. Otherwise, you’re going to wind up with a bunch really pissed off capital pilots. However, this can’t come at the cost of being oppressive to subcap PvP.

So, how do you make that work? Well, take the following with a grain of salt, but I heard that CCP used to be fine with capitals being uber powerful because they felt like this would be balanced by their cost and rarity. Then capitals became more and more common, and this plan went to total ■■■■. Moreover, balancing solely by cost isn’t the best idea to begin with. Don’t get me wrong, I think cost can and should play a role in balance, but it can’t be the lynch pin upon which balance depends.

But I digress, and the question still remains -how do we balance capitals? Well, not only do I not have the answer, but I’m also not sure that CCP does either. They’ve done things to address capital proliferation, and tweaked things that affect application to subcaps, but these seem more like bandaids than true solutions. So, idk.

Regardless, caps are still quite powerful, still rather oppressive to subcap fleets, and still play critical roles in many organizations’ and individuals’ goals. So, I’m not exactly sure why some people are acting like caps have been nerfed into the ground.

I guess any nerfs are bad when you think caps should be a trump card.

[Luwc]

/thread.

[Oriki_Ahvilen]

@Clary_Daemon

it appears ccp wants to limit big ships.

Praise BoB ! Delete all titans !

@Clary_Daemon

The first day I came to eve, I determined that I would be an Avatar pilot at some point.

So the first day you thought of a space coffin, because there’s nothing else you can do in Eve , there’s not enough subcapitals that you can experiment with , not enough roles that you can have . Never mind learning how to pvp with frigates and work your way up from there, never mind learning how to be a good tackler , a good dictor pilot, a good logi pilot , never mind experimenting with ewar ships, never mind learning how to spearfish , never mind fun with small nano gangs, RR gangs, etc. There’s nothing that you can do in Eve but to grind a space coffin , attend to a big tidi fest you have been waiting for years and then quit .

@Clary_Daemon

Then I see some changes to mining and ratting that take away from the glory of being a capital pilot.

I understand… you just want to krab more in your capitals and nothing else

@Clary_Daemon

Big ships take a hell of a lot of investment. They should be encouraged, as all the noteworthy battles involve them, and it takes a lot to build them.

There was a time when they were a lot of investment, but up until recently it was relatively easy…
No… they shouldn’t be encouraged…
Your cancerous tidi fest battles in nullsec mean nothing to me and I’m not the only one…
It took a lot to build them before 2016 and now with the changes CCP are implementing they try to reverse the disaster they started in 2016. The nullsec ore table at that time was modified so you can have your tritanium/pyerite/mexallon needs to print supers in null instead of importing them under the form of large railguns which to reprocess. Then they gave you the Fozzie Rorqual which at first was able to out mine a large fleet of Hulks alone, pretty f* up for a “boosting” capital ship, after that you got the Sotiyo which cuts the build time for supers and titans by about half iirc …
All of this combined was just too much, a tumor recipe.

@Clary_Daemon

Please stop making big ships irrelevant. Encourage large ships.
They should be hard to beat, and very good at killing

They are not irrelevant, still hard to beat and good at killing . They just got properly balanced . I do not know what CCP was thinking when they gave titans HAW guns , in the past there was a very good reason why we got rid of what we called tracking titans, but they realized this and took them away . Same goes for supers , they just had too good of a damage application for their fighters and no penalty for activating NSA, and they still apply damage well to subcaps regarding the nerf…

[Red-Sonja]

I don’t see what’s wrong with anyone wanting to fly a capital ship on their first day. It gives them a goal and, correct me if I’m wrong but this is a sandbox game, right? Right?

[Avaelica_Kuershin]

I would say the major problem with having a titan as the main goal is you can miss out on a lot getting there especially if you go for the fastest training plan.
You could be in the position where you have the skills for a titan but but be missing some for other, smaller, doctrine ships.

[Red-Sonja]

@Avaelica_Kuershin

if you go for the fastest training plan.

And if you don’t ?

What if you set skill queue towards a capital but interlace other skills within the capital line of skills? Modules need skills too, unless you plan on not playing until all the ships skills are through training but that would be a waste of Omega time.

Not only that but by the time you reach the skill that permits you to get into a capital there would’ve been a slew of other skills trained since it’s a linear training process. Frigate —> Destroyer ----> Cruiser ----> Battlecruiser —> Battleship —> Carrier —> Dreadnought —> Force Auxilary —> Super Carrier —> Titan.

@Avaelica_Kuershin

You could be in the position where you have the skills for a titan but but be missing some for other, smaller, doctrine ships

You “could” but not necessarily.

[Daichi_Yamato]

If super-capitals died more often then making them powerful and balancing by cost would be more effective.

But since they don’t die that much, especially when used for ratting, they need their power kept in check, especially when ratting.

Or we make flying them less safe, especially when ratting.

[hellokittyonline]

Big ships are boring to fly and the content they provide is equally boring. Actually, cap ships are pretty bad for the game as a whole. There really isn’t an upside to them for 99% of the playerbase and they’re pretty much only there as a toy for the whales. I actually wish CCP would remove cap ships entirely, the game would actually be better off if they did.

[Kezrai_Charzai]

As others have said, Cap ships were great for CCP’s goal: driving players to make large investments in colonizing Null space so they could crank out caps/supercaps/titans. They’re not so great for actual gameplay.

Unfortunately CCP bollixed it when they decided that to drive players into the arms of Nullblocs so they could rake in more and more subs from fewer players, they had to make Null a cornucopia of wealth and the caps/supercaps/titans proliferated like mad.

Now they’re an unbalanced element of the game. They’re too big and expensive to risk casually, and they’re just silly for farming with, they’re out of proportion for Low-sec drops, and basically they’re a solution looking for a problem to solve. Other than grudge-match wars in Null, I guess.

CCP needs to develop better reasons to use/risk/lose caps, and better balance between subcaps and caps.

[Clary_Daemon]

Perhaps you should read some of the dev blogs, and the changes that limit some of the biggest ships.

I prefer to mine with my titan.

[Gowa_Hyasyoda]

CAPS…

SUPER CAPS!

[Shipwreck_Jones]

@Red-Sonja

I don’t see what’s wrong with anyone wanting to fly a capital ship on their first day. It gives them a goal and, correct me if I’m wrong but this is a sandbox game, right? Right?

Long term aspirational goals help to keep players in the game, give them direction, and working towards and achieving goals are fun. However, the problems with Titans are:

• flying a titan apparently sucks - Some people seem to like it, but:
  • they are infrequently used
  • the battles in which they are used often have soul crushing tidi
  • using them is often very boring- Aiming bosons apparently takes some skill, but firing doomsdays in TiDi basically consists of pressing F1, setting a timer for 2 hours, and then going to do something else for a while.
  • they are still like space coffins- Since they can now dock in keepstars, you don’t have to keep a toon in it all times, but you also can’t use if for other things (i.e. subcap PvP). Otherwise you won’t be able to drop when capitals actually are deployed.
• it requires so much isk and time that the grind can suck the fun out of the game - Newbros grinding to plex their accounts would probably be less grueling and less likely to result in burnout.
• Eve is in active development, which means the ship they started training for might not be the ship that they get. - which sets up players for even more disappointment (i.e. rising costs that push the goal posts further back and nerfs which make them feel like CCP is pissing on their efforts). I mean, with a 2-3 year goal, you are effectively guaranteeing that you will be a laggard.

Now, I’m not trying to piss on anyone’s dreams or fun. If you like working towards or flying a titan, then great. The problem, however, is that it’s a goal that seems to lead at least some newbros towards serious disappointment. Newbros decide that they want to fly titans because they’re cool, and not because they understand anything about game balance, how they’re used, what is required, or anything like that. And not only can they miss out on a lot of fun as they work towards that long-term goal, but they often get a rude awakening when the reality of titan ownership finally becomes apparent. And quite frankly, I think the problem would be even worse if there weren’t a crap ton of people warning newbros about the realities of titan ownership, and advising them to concentrate on maximizing their fun per hour now, instead of working towards “fun” 3 years down the line.

[Clary_Daemon]

I’ve spent the better part of a year learning skills for the avatar on this character, and over 2 years on my alts.
Max skills is important, and the skill books are costly. The hull alone is worth more than the majority of people can afford.
I have 2 hulls, one almost completely fit, the other one not so much.
That investment should be worth something, and the ships should be harder to kill than 10 bombers can muster.
That’s without logi.

They are very large ships, and should be faster in a straight line that any small ship.
Irl you can’t expect a few speed boats to best an aircraft carrier. It just won’t happen.

Titans should be like the irl nuclear deterrent. M.A.D. at the very least.

Ccp is lowering, or already has, the amount of ore, which makes titans even harder to get. A single person isn’t going to gather enough to build a titan anytime soon. It would take years.
Whole coalitions with buyback systems have set up for the production of super caps and titans.

Basically, I’m saying that since a titan is the top skill, and highest cost item in the game, they should be very hard to break.
However, it seems that the goal going forward is to make them easier to kill, and harder to get.
They’re already easy to kill. How many have died in the last month alone?
Galactic war is a real goal for a lot of people, and significant wins and losses go into that. If you want war, and it appears a lot of people do, then a lot of production has to happen to feed the war.
If you want 100b killmails, you have to see titans out waging war.
This game has made history with the pvp and wars of the past, and the current one is shaping up to be noteworthy.
Nobody is going to talk about the munnins. They’re going to talk about epic titan kills, and epic super carriers being killed.
Keep that hard work important.

[Oriki_Ahvilen]

@Clary_Daemon

They are very large ships, and should be faster in a straight line that any small ship.
Irl you can’t expect a few speed boats to best an aircraft carrier. It just won’t happen.

Seriously ?! They should be the fastest because they are large … LOL
Anyway, Nimitz class carrier ~ 35 MPH, motor speed boats anywhere between 100 - 300 MPH.

@Clary_Daemon

should be harder to kill than 10 bombers can muster.

Well with just 10 bombers on grid , you can just warp out xD

@Clary_Daemon

Ccp is lowering, or already has, the amount of ore, which makes titans even harder to get.

Unfortunately a bit late tbh …

@Clary_Daemon

They’re already easy to kill. How many have died in the last month alone?

Many , due to poor decision making from one of the belligerents , but you have to keep in mind that they died fighting the same class … fight fire with fire… they haven’t died to subcapitals there.

@Clary_Daemon

Titans should be like the irl nuclear deterrent. M.A.D. at the very least.

They already are but it seems that you just don’t understand this game at all.

Anyway , I think is time for you to stop trolling , this is not the first troll thread opened by you.

[zazzmatazz_Xu]

@Shipwreck_Jones

and the question still remains -how do we balance capitals?

Easy answer to this, have titans limited to each alliance and corporation in NULL, if they want unlimited titans then make WH space as it is now the new NULL deep space in WH, this way unlimited titans can beat each other silly over the prizes in NULL 2.0 of course this means moving some NULL stuff over to NULL 2.0

[Clary_Daemon]

Disagreeing with my opinion doesn’t make my opinion a troll.

To your point about the speed; titans don’t face the friction and resistance that a carrier on earth does. One is in space, the other is in water.
Titans clearly have very large engines, so they should be able to reach high speeds.

I am aware that most of the caps in m2 were killed by other caps. That’s the point. We need more ground breaking fights like that, not less.
Many people have come back specifically for the war.
We need a large, active player base to keep the game going for the next 10 years.

Titans aren’t really at the level of nuclear deterrent. Tactics dictate they’re reserved, not because of overwhelming power, but because of price tag.
I understand this game perfectly well. Again, just because you don’t agree with my opinion does not make my opinion an attempt at trolling, nor does it diminish my intelligence.

[hellokittyonline]

Titans are boring and lame and provide no real content for anyone save being a giant pinata. Furthermore you say you’re building one slowly but for what purpose? You cant afford to lose it so why bother?

Cap ships weren’t created for you and I. They were created so whales can throw money at each other. They create nothing but trash content anyways.