Currently the only ships that are invisible on D-scan are the combat recon ships. This ship is the logical progression from the EW frigates. Therefore, as the EW frigates already share the same bonuses/roles, i feel they should also have D-scan immunity.
This would make these paper thin ships more practical to use which would make frigate comps more viable.
I thought recon cruisers were kind of a mix of covert ops and EW ships. They are there for both scouting (recon!) and EWar, hence the cloaky/no D-Scan bonus. Frigate wise, you have to choose whether you have a sneaky scout ship (covert ops frig) or an EWar ship (EW frig).
If you give more sneakiness to the EW frigs, you make them increasingly competitive with covert ops as scouts. Also, paper thin implies being on grid and targeted. Not showing up on d-scan does not help with that any way. It helps in scouting or hiding, roles that are much more fitting for covert ops.
Not necessarily. D-scan gives you advanced warning of your potential targets. Seeing that flimsy E-war frigs are heading your way allows you to pre-emptiveley select those as your target as they can really change a fight.
Combat recon d-scan immunity is not really used for scouting/recon, it is used to surprise a target and hide your numbers.
Giving EW frigs this immunity does not encroach on the scouting role as the main advantages of a shout ship is cloaking and probing.
This is because it’s extremely powerful and fits their recon role. It was added because they were seeing far less use than the force recons. E- war frigates have no need for this buff.
Your logic doesn’t even hold up. One sub class of e-war ships out of all the e-war ships has immunity thus another random e-war class should get it as well?
I don’t see a specific need, but that doesn’t mean this change should never happen. D-scan immunity is a functionality buff that might see ewar frigates used more often. I love that immunity on recons. It would play havoc with FW space though
I don’t think your have really thought about it and your comments didn’t really make much scene or have a point to them. I explained my reasoning quite clearly and i disagree that e-war immunity is a massive advantage… even less so on a frigate!
Go and compare the role bonuses of EW frigates and Combat recons and then come back and explain why my “logic doesn’t hold-up”.
Because there are loads of e-war ships all with those or similar bonuses. Combat recons are the outlier not the rule.
D-scan immunity is a very big advantage particularly on a fast moving frigate. Particularly in FW or WH
So it actually is an anti-recon ship!
Called it!
Several times by now!
EW frigates see lots of usage. They’re plenty powerful, and cheap enough to just be thrown away.
As was mentioned, the “recon” role has d-scan immunity because it makes them excellent for leading a vanguard charge into a system.
Saying nothing of the advantages in wormholes, imagine 3-4 combat recons scouting for your HAC fleet. They stay +1, they hunt the locals, the HAC fleet just stays on the other side of the gate ready to hop-to when tackle is called.
You’re quite used to spamming dscan to avoid cepters. Or at least, you should be if you live outside of HS. This gives hunters a different mechanic… slower, more deliberate, tankier. That battleship running a site could for instance grapple, neut, and blap your cepter. A Lachesis (they all have their use-cases, I find flying the Lachesis the most satisfying) with 3x range scripts and a scram, on the other hand, you won’t even be able to target them from 20km away, let alone escape. If you manage to get inside of that 20km, you’ve still got to burn through a 40-60k buffer while they try to get out of your lock range.
On the other hand, consider ewar frigates.
They don’t warp in ahead of the fleet, because their tanks are dependant on their ewar; an unfavourable circumstance means your ship is dead. Your frigates either warp with or after your fleet, at a good distance. They help control the grid to give your fleet an advantage over the other fleet.
the hell it isn’t we use them almost exclusively whenever we need scouting in J-space as there is almost 0 chance of them being noticed unless they have a scout on the hole
It would be a bit over powered to have recon invisibility with the agility and locking speed of a frigate, people already cry about ewar.
Maybe you are right… I just feel like they are missing something.
what do you mean? they are some of the strongest ships in the game. most are just as strong as their cruiser counterparts for 10x cheaper. only give up a mid or two and some hard tank. though they generally make up for the tank loss in speed and sig
In a small gang they are definitely a force multiplier
not to mention how quick they are for new players to train yet have a huge impact. hell the t1 take less than a day and can swing a fight in your favor
The vigil could do with something, the others are all able to get results or am I missing something about it’s consistent zero solo kills on the kill board.
… you’re missing the entire point of these ships
Also i was under the impression we were talking about EAFs if this thread is about the t1 my answer goes from no to BoB no
Maybe but I think I am right in saying the vigil should be a little better at holding it’s own
It’s an e-war ship… it’s perfectly balanced within the context of its intended use and is not broken outside that context. If you want a combat vigil use the fleet vigil.
Not every ship needs to be able to solo nor should ccp waist their time chasing that impractical goal
Not sure your point is valid 3 e-war ships are perfectly good on their own 1 can’t pull the skin off a custard and has very limited uses.