Dev blog: Balance Changes Coming In The March Release

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For only and exactly the same reasons cruisers would have to escape from a battleship group now. If you’re not looking at escape or pursuit, warp speed’s not a consideration anyway.

No, they don’t. Nothing represents ‘most battleships’. Does a Typhoon represent a Hyperion terribly well? Does it represent any Gallente or Amarr battleships? At best, it’s representative of itself and maybe Ravens. And, you know, maybe kinda sorta flapjacksBarghests.

If you’re going to generalize about a group of ships that are actually fairly diverse, you can’t really go ‘oh, but THOSE aren’t representative’ because… well, no one or two ships represents the entire class. The Mael’s a very different critter from a Mega, which is very different thing than a Scorpion, which is very different from a Geddon…

If you’re building a battleship fleet, and you insist ‘YOU CAN ONLY USE ONE TYPE OF BATTLESHIP FOR THIS’… it better be pre-patch Machs. Cuz nothing else does everything.

Being slow as hell is the trade-off for being the ‘big’ subcapital ship, with the most tank and the most damage. There’s a pretty strong case to be made that we’re at a point of capital (and super-capital) proliferation where the line between ‘capital’ and ‘sub-capital’ in terms of ‘what might get dropped on your head’ has been completely wiped out, but that’s a much bigger issue than ‘how fast do I warp?’

And frankly, it should be tackled as a bigger issue—one of 'what the actual hell are these ships supposed to do, and do they do it?

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I follow the logic but i think you misunderstood what i meant.

Barghests and bhaalgorns do not represent what all battleships are capable of as they have unique roles and stats that are not shared in the other battleship lines.

There isnt another fast battleship that has an EWAR bonus that has damage bonused RHML (barghest). Just like there isnt another battleship with super neuts/Nos that has web bonuses (bhaal). Those traits make them viable to kill smaller ships easier than other battleships. It gives them a niche to perfom well in and id say they are at outlier, not the norm.

Most other battleships need to make larger sacrifices to get a similar effect. There is also a big difference between pirate BS and standard BS.

Its like saying an omen is just as well suited at anti tackle as a Nomen or Phantasm.

When you say the largest subcap with the most tank, that is also a generalization. Some BS will struggle to break 115k EHP. While a navy aug can get 150-180k. We have T3s breaking into and past some BS tanks. Youve got command ships like the damnation which border on small capital ship EHP values.

If we want BS to find a role, their tanks and accessory stats need to be refined.

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There aren’t a lot of battleships bonused for RHMLs. But there’s the Vindicator, if you get past the type of weapon: bonus to EWAR and weapons. The thing about pirate battleships, though, is that they cost more, and they take twice the skill training to get into. That’s how they’re ‘balanced’ against the rest of the battleship line. You can argue that those are, in today’s EVE, a pretty weak way to balance them, and you wouldn’t be wrong. But it’s how CCP chooses to balance their increased capabilities.

And no, I wouldn’t say that an Omen is ‘the same as’ a Phantasm. I also wouldn’t go assuming that a cruiser roam is going to be all Omens. Maybe mostly Omens, sure, but I’ll bet it’ll bring T2 logistics, Combat Recons, maybe even Pirate cruisers, because those roles all need filling.

An Omen isn’t kitted out for tackle unless it sacrifices speed, dps/application, or tank. You bring a different type of cruiser. Similarly, for battleship roams you bring battleships that do that. Not just ‘everyone in Apocs’.

I mean, you’re not here telling me ‘battleships can’t be good logistics platforms’, even though, you know… they can’t. (The Nestor is a bad logistics platform.) Most cruisers can’t do it, either. You bring specialized cruisers for that role.

Personally, I think there should be a battleship-scale logi platform, and maybe the T2 cruiser-sized platforms should see their remote rep capability reduced a little… stick the BS-sized platform in between current T2 logi and Force Auxiliaries in capability… but I digress.

It is. But if you bring the Navy cruisers (and the T2/T3 cruisers) into it, then you also have to bring the Navy and T2 Battleships into it. As for the Damnation… yeah, it and the Legion can hit 1M EHP with implants, heat and deadspace mods. That’s damned impressive.

So can a Paladin, btw. 1.09M, slightly higher than the Damnation’s 1.04 or the Legion’s 1.01.

But I agree that things need to be refined. Like I said: I think it should be part of a much larger ‘what do we actually intend each kind of ship to be?’ effort.

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That’s assuming a battleship had enough firepower and armor to defend itself against several frigates.

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No, that’s assuming a battleship is a Large-sized hull. Slow and ponderous. Orcas don’t have enough firepower and armor to defend themselves against several frigates, after all.

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I understand the arguments about warp speeds here and I am sympathetic to both sides.

However, I feel I have to side with the idea of increasing warp speeds across the board by 1 AU as was suggested above. This is simply because as has been stated EvE is a game. A game that we play which is already an incredible time sink to get anything meaningful done in game. Lowering the travel time of ships in game will increase everyone’s QoL. Travel times are already quite high. It is boring to just keep warping to each gate and the time spent in warp isn’t really “fun time”.

The only downside to an increase in warp speeds is the effect on a QRF (quick reaction force) who are flying to someone’s rescue. Time before reinforcements arrive will be shortened somewhat. Not sure how terrible that would be but it would be an effect.

The other effect is the effectiveness of warp speed upgrades (Rigs and implants). A single T2 rig currently pushes a BS from 2 AU’s to 2.5AU’s. If the base warp speed was 3 AU’s this boost from a single rig would go up to 3.75 AU’s. I personally don’t see this as an issue as I believe a single warp speed rig should give a decent and noticeable boost to make it attractive to fit. Currently though, as with many things in the EvE game, rigs could use a massive overhaul.

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We are talking about 1 second here (1 AU increase). Nobody is talking about increasing align time as well and you have to calculate that into travel time too.

rhiload summed it well in that video.

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OMG probably my favorite video out there!!!

Thank you and thank you Rhiload

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yep, I pissed my pants, I’m not even pvper but I love to watch his videos. His “balance legion” puns everywhere :joy:

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Fleet phoon, typhoon, raven, SNI, golem, widow (if we are talking all battleship sized hulls) are all bonused to RHML. Fleet phoon could be a poor mans barg, speed is similar and it has dual neuts.

See, i gotta disagree with you about pirate BS costs. Years ago when i was PVE’ing my heart out to afford fleet ships and to save up for a mach, pirate BS were all 800m+. The mach i finally bought was 1.2b for just the hull. That was expensive. Nowadays though? Most are cheaper than the navy battleships excluding maybe the barghest and mach (though with mach changes on the horizon, people seem to be dumping them, ive seen the price drop by about 100m). Some, like the bhaal might as well be a t1 BS, as ive seen them in the 230-280m range, hell its cheaper than HACs atm.

Ofc supply and demand play a role here, so its not like they were designed to be cheap, just the krabs have been working 24/7 and flooding the market. The point still stands that most pirate ships are no where near being expensive in the current meta.

Price doesnt really factor into the balance of pirate BS when they are comparable to t1 in some cases and cheaper/comparable to navy in others. Skills do play a role here i admit, but is largely circumvented by things like injectors.

Does this help open up the pirate line for people to enjoy and have variety? Sure. But it skews balance discussion as by design, they do not represent what is typical in most other battleships. They have powerful bonuses (roles and traits) that other BS do not have, along with additional slots.

T2 battleships cannot get close to the EHP/damage mitigation values of some smaller ships. Yes a paladin can break 1b EHP, but its immobile and its costs may exceed that of a capital with worse insurance payout. There is a reason we dont see paladin fleets, but do see navy aug fleets and t3 fleets. The tempest fleet is around 180 to 240k depending on fits/links in fleet. Napoc is around 220k before links. A devoter can get to 200k EHP before links, and as discussed already, a damnation gets over 1b EHP. Battleships that start to exceed 300k base EHP become impractical either through price, mobility or damage/projection. So even when comparing navy and t2, theres still not much of a discrepancy between what tanky cruisers get and tanky battleships get.

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If you want a ship that warps at 3AU, use a cruiser.

BCs at 2.75AU arent far off if you want more beef.

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Before I figured hics out, mine had about 1m ehp but you better active tank a hic or it will just be an expensive loss-mail waiting to happen.

Anyhow, I agree the warp deceleration of a battleship is a huge deterrent.

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Immobility is not that reason. The reason is the paladin’s expensive as hell, and whatever you field will die in some numbers. So rather than force the extended training and high price tag, you go for the disposable. Navy Augs aren’t even close to the damage mitigation of a marauder. Bricked-out Legions are, but just bricked-out Legions. And they still get ripped up by battlecruiser fleets.

Btw, the TFI and Napoc aren’t T2 battleships.

And Damnations get to 1m, if fully-tanked and heated, with implants. Not 1b.

By the way, the TFI? 235k before boosts/implants/anything, T2 tank. Fitting it out the way you’d fit the Damnation… 830k w/the same heat that gets the Damnation to 1.04m. Not so far off. That TFI with just boosts gets to 324k EHP.

Nor is a Damnation a cruiser. It’s a T2 Battlecruiser, and in its case, it’s a ship whose T2, specialized purpose, is to be tanky as hell. That’s what it’s for. Unlike the TFI, that Damnation isn’t also putting out 8300 damage volleys.

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I pretty much already said all those things. TFI is 180-240k depending on fit. Paladin fleets arent a thing because theyre immobile and expensive as hell.

I never claimed the TFI and Napoc were t2. Theyre faction, just like the navy aug (you mentioned comparing faction to faction, t2 to t2). They are also the higher EHP navy ships in the class that are actually useful.

There is realistically only 1 t2 fleet BS, which is the marauder which will probably never be a fleet doctrine due to cost. BLOPs are t2, but might as well be oversized BCs as far as their tank goes.

Im simply pointing out that navy/t2 battleships tank is not hard to reach with other ships for comparable price. Frankly BS buffer tanks feel quite weak in most cases.

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Why take supers to a fight when standard capitals will do the job - Fuk’n easy, they do more damage, cost more, have better tanks - And can help you win fights.

The EXACT same principal applies to subcaps.
Eve is about winning the objective, whether it be sov of a system or beating up on those neighbours you don’t like.
When they can field battleships as a defence fleet why shouldn’t we be able to field them as a roaming fleet? (I suppose we could just keep baiting with a few cruisers then smash them with carriers and dreads but that isn’t really roaming, is it?)

It’s called “balance”, when one side can always field the superior fleet, it isn’t.

NB; Even after the March changes (March is half over btw CCP) Taking out a Ferox roam [unless caught at zero on a gate] is going to smash any unprepared defence fleet. Should warp speed of Ferox’s also be nerfed because it is unfair to defenders?

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My take on it is that this is actually an artifact of enemy BS damage being so much higher than cruiser damage (especially when the Machariel has been so ubiquitous).

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You can.
Just at 2AU.

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Salvos Rhoska
You can.
Just at 2AU.

I luv it. You finally show your true colours with one tiny irrelevant post. *actually your last 3 posts in this thread have offered nothing of value to anything remotely close to the topic being discussed.

So;
As you clearly show here, you really don’t have clue or anything to offer on the subject, why do you bother posting at all when players want to discuss ways they see could improve the way we play the game, create more content, open up new opportunities.

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I get it.
You want to roam in BS at faster AU than now.

I say, no.
Use cruisers or BC instead.

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Cruisers will still be the faster option and the same degree faster than currently. It’s simply that everything gets faster, so its less painful to travel in a subcap over the long distances necessary. You’re still going to use Orthruses and not a Typhoon 90% of the time, but it means that the 10% of the time you’d be ok using a Phoon it takes less actual time than before, though your relative speed advantages are static.

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