So whoever has greater numbers can ECM spam the other team to the point of enabling them to do nothing?
What’s wrong with the fixed debuff, which is already pretty damn significant?
This would render drone-based ships and combat doctrines completely and totally useless. It’s already hard enough in nullsec when you’ve got bombs and smartbombs blowing up everywhere. Adding such a feature would cripple drones even more. Most players feel drones need enhancement, not nerfing (directly or indirectly)
This is the kind of critical thinking to enhance drone gameplay, not make it worse than it already is.
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All EWAR as currently implemented is an incredulously massive tide turner. While Damps and ECM aren’t as valuable unless you are part of and/or facing a large enemy force, it takes only a single weapon disruptor or target painter to completely turn the tide of battle, providing greater contributions than even logi with regards to support.
Serious question: what is your PVP background? While not perfect, I have a hard time envisioning anyone looking to make such radical changes if they were currently fielding EWAR properly, especially after ECM has been reworked after years of being in an uncomfortable position. Some would go as far as to say EWAR is overpowered as it is (I make no comment on this), and more likely to require diminishing returns like logi rather than escalating effects (as if the enemy ships were adjusting to the affects and compensating). So my question is: What problem is being solved? On what objective basis is the gameplay being improved (before and after)?
makes it seem like you do not know that of which you speak. ECM, after years of being in an acceptable position has been reworked making it effectively useless in anything but large scale engagements, especially when you can bring damps and have just as devastating effect as ECM used to have.
Also this:
ECM is no longer valuable, damps are still as strong as ever, in small gang/solo or anywhere else. Further, not sure who you’ve been talking to but anyone who thinks that any form of ewar on its own stands even close to:
simply does not have a clue.
It would be nice if CCP were to finish the job, or revert the ECM changes, but leaving an entire line of ships in the worse than useless category is just ■■■■■■■■.
I find it interesting that you completely ignored part of my post which talked about countermeasures against EWAR.
If the countermeasures are effective the system can work. Consider a sensor booster with an ECCM script “boosting” sensor strength back up to max a portion each cycle like a cap booster works. If it was fuelled in some way it would still create opportunities of vulnerability. Passive modules that either just resist the effect (think cap batteries vs neuts) or give a slow recharge of sensors (or both) it would create a more interesting EWAR environment which would work in solo, small gang and large scale.
Currently, RSD’s can be devastating and they have an instant effect. You can use them like old ECM worked in the past. TD’s GD’s are exceptionally powerful and also work instantly. Full effect as soon as they are activated and utterly devastating to weapon performance.
I just believe that an EWAR system that worked similar across the board but effected different attributes would be more effective and easier to use than the current system.
I rarely see anyone using EWAR effectively other than some ecm drones and the odd TD but I never see anyone flying with dedicated EWAR platforms
That is odd my join date is many years after I’ve been playing on this account
Anyway! You know, @Spugg_Galdon, I agree with the vast majority of what you are saying. The difference between you and me is not really a matter of disagreement, but perhaps how we are using ECM. We have found ECM incredulously effective (and perhaps even overpowered) in both theory and practice, and my crew has used it to great effect - not better or worse than remote sensor damps, but different, and we employ them both accordingly. I’m thinking where we differ is in our expectations or use patterns of ECM, and that is where we have different experiences and feelings toward ECM.
I’ve conducted combinatorial probabilistic analysis of ECM and found that, even after accounting for stacking penalties, and even moreso now that the strength of all ECM has increased by 20% (I believe it was; and range as well), that even a T1M0 Griffin can reliably cripple a heavily ECCMed ship with scattered ECMs over a long period of time (such as a T3C). We’ve put this into practice, and it works. And it works that much better when you’re using T2+ fits and Blackbirds, Kitsunes, Scorpions, etc. That CCP gave most ECM ships increased PG/CPU makes them that much more effective than they were before.
So you are not wrong at all. I do understand where you’re coming from. I just want you to understand where I’m coming from, too: we’ve found ECM, both before and after the changes, to be miraculous. It is not a substitute for damps, and is neither better or worse, just different. Sometimes we use one, sometimes the other, sometimes both - we have established use cases for ECM and when it’s appropriate to use it meets or exceeds our expectations consistently.
I respect your feedback and apologize if I came off as argumentative. I respect you and your viewpoints and feel we have more in common than not.
What I’m trying to get at is that people complain about EWAR because of how devastating it is. And the devastation is instant. All other Mechanics in the game are an effect over time, except for tackle which makes sense (although you could argue that webs could have an effect build up too which would stop the “web align” exploit)
My point is that if EWAR had an effect over time then it could still be very powerful without being something that people struggle to counter. A draining effect would give people time to react and try to do something. This way ECM could still eventually completely lock you out of targeting but it wouldn’t be instant (my god, I’m old enough to remember the bad old days of Falcon Perma Jam from insane ranges. It wasn’t fun.) Also, it would mean that your ECM is having some effect instead of just rolling the dice each cycle and hoping you get lucky.
This would also make EWAR platforms REAL force multipliers and really really worth considering in all fleets as you can spread your EWAR out and wait for it to build the effect.
Also, electronic support platforms could become a thing and be the fleet version of countering EWAR. Think the opposite of an EWAR platform performing electronic “reps” like logistics to counter the effects.
So, why not entertain me and suggest how you think a sensor booster could work in relation to a “Drain Effect” ECM module and how sensor strength total and number of lockable targets can then have a relationship in order to calculate current number of lockable targets when getting drained an amount per ECM cycle. How some modules could cycle quickly but low strength and visa versa.
It’s one of those things where it could work as a completely different system as you described and be completely feasible, so I agree your system or some variant thereof would work. Personally I like it the way it is now, especially since you will always maintain lock/be able to target the ECMer itself, thereby giving combat ships the opportunity to defend themselves and rendering ECM useless in solo engagements. Combined with fleet vs fleet tactics and coordination, I think it’s a good balance of power without being overpowered.
I’d entertain you with hypotheticals, but I’m so busy kicking butt with existing ECM at the moment that I don’t know if I’ll have the time or the will to discuss changing it
So to balance that out to everything else that is actually oppressing and devastating, I support the idea of making tracking disruption, guidance disruption, target painting, long points, scrams, stasis webifiers and energy neutralizers also useless in a 1v1 situation.
That way only player skill will be taken into account and makes all things equal.
No in this case it didn’t. You are right. The list was not complete but nevertheless a composition of things ECM jamming never did to any ship.
FoF missiles are just another example of this to use to defend yourself. We all have been there, at some point we all got jammed and it sucked for 20 seconds but even I, queen of complaints, never complained about ECM jamming.
It was always something you had to deal with in a pvp were everyone is always going to kill your ship.
Now, I can get behind an idea of a spoolup jam that increases in power of time but for all things being equal, why do the Caldari have to suffer for this?
All other forms of ewar work all the time, on and off.
If we want to accomplish “equality”, this works both ways. If all other forms of ewar would fail 56% of the time and every cycle would become a gamble, we would get said equality.
Yes it does, but if the other EWAR (TD/GD’s and RSD’s) had more of a draining effect or spool up effect it would equal out. I wouldn’t mind Webs having a spool up either, with diminishing power increments for each cycle.
Falloff can work very well too as it would just simply mean the effect would take longer.
The real question is this: How should counter-countermeasures work? Would a passive resistance to the effect be better or an active boosting effect be a good idea?
So drain ECM…
For example, you have a sensor strength of 22 and can lock 8 targets. Your sensor strength per target would be 22/8=2.75 S/S points per target locked. (arbitrary numbers)
You get hit by an ECM module that drains 50% of your current S/S per cycle.
1st cycle drains S/S to 11. 11 / 2.75 = 4 lockable targets.
2nd cycle drains S/S to 5.5. 5.5 / 2.75 = 2 lockable targets
3rd cycle drains S/S to 2.75 = 1 lockable target
4th cycle drains S/S to 1.375 = zero lockable targets
How would you implement that? A sensor booster that spools up the amount of target locks from 0 to 1 to the amount the ship had before?
Make it like a dust cloud that increases in size. The first ecm mod engulfs the ship, then drone 1 for a second ecm, then drone 2 and so on until the drones are all going idle and a maximum of 6 ecm modules would mean that a 7th would not longer have any effect at all or would decrease the cycle time of a sensor booster down to a maximum of 30 seconds with a starting cycle time of 10 seconds.
I would rather there be another EWAR type that disrupted drone control than ECM doing that.
Well this is the question. I believe that counter countermeasures are the real key to making EWAR work in a balanced way.
So, if we treat Sensor Strength (S/S) as an attribute which charges up over time we can use modules to change that charge time or boost it by a set amount or resist debuff effects. Literally just think of Capacitor and all the modules that effect capacitor.
You can then diversify EWAR modules to the effect that, for example, a fast cycling module would have a lower effect per cycle but wouldn’t disable S/S recharge but a slow cycling module would have a high effect per cycle and debuff or completely disable S/S recharge rate.
So your counter-countermeasure modules (and skills) can defend you in several ways. A booster type (which should either be fuelled or require heavy capacitor use) would “inject” S/S to allow you to relock targets between cycles or a passive module would resist the effects and/or increase the total S/S pool.
(Think Cap boosters and Cap batteries). Other passive modules could increase S/S recharge and there is even the possibility of an aggressive countermeasure similar to a Nos. A Sensor Vampire which would be a high slot module to allow you to drain the target S/S to add to your S/S.
But it would behave the same way as capacitor and that doesn’t seem complicated.
My point to all of this is to make all EWAR work in this fashion. Instead of instant effects it would require more of a spool up. This way you can always get to the completely incapacitating EWAR effect but it wouldn’t happen instantly.
