EWAR Battleships

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
1

Lots of new ships have been added to the small ship classes in the past several years, but not much for bigger ships. We have had T3Ds, Command dessies, EWAR faction frigates and the endurance. Not to mention recent buffs to AF and HACs.

It appears a niche could be had for battleships with ewar applications (albeit, in limited application so as not to feel too overpowered or make dedicated EWAR less effecitve).

There are already 2 EWAR battleships in the T1 line, the scorpion and armageddon. So we could add or repurpose 2 more T1 EWAR battleships for minmatar and gallente. Or we repurpose the existing T1 EWAR battleships to full combat ships and create faction EWAR battleship line (like the faction EWAR figates).

Option 1
If we repurpose existing T1 battleships, the typhoon could drop the explosion velocity bonus in favor of a targeting painting bonus (which would help in application of all missiles, not just torps/cruise like its current bonus).

Gallente is a little more troublesome, as the mega and domi are effective with their bonuses. The best fit would be the domi, as it has more mids and doesnt risk as much application loss since it relies on drones. It would gain a disruptor/scram range increase.

Why TP and Disruptor/scram bonuses?
We dont need more long range webs, we have the bhaal for that anyway. Battleships suffer from application issues with their larger weapons, a TP bonus lets both guns and missiles apply very well. Its like a super tracking computer for guns, as sig radius increase = easier tracking.

As for disruptor/scram range, BS scan res is too poor to try and lock another ship to properly implement damps, esp if its another EWAR ship, or to switch targets quickly. Scram/disruptor bonuses would help allow the slow domi potentially catch faster ships and extends its tackle range so drones can chew people up. We could consider rolling the drone optimal or tracking bonuses from the replaced trait into the 10% damage/Hp bonus.

Option 2
The second option would be to convert the geddon and scorpion into fully fleshed out attack ships. Then make the Scorp navy, geddon navy, domi navy and typhoon navy into combat EWAR ships, similar to the faction EWAR frigs, but without the penalty.

They would have 2 traditional combat traits like they do now but with a role bonus to their respective EWAR.

Typhoon FI = 25% bonus to target painter effectiveness
Domi NI = 50% bonus to scram/disruptor range
Scorpion Navy issue = 75% bonus to ECM and ECM Burst jammer strength
Armageddon NI = 50% nuetralizer optimal range and 25% falloff bonus

This keeps the original EWAR bonuses from t1 hulls (scorp loses range admittedly) and for the typhoon and domi, they are half of what dedicated EWAR ships provide. Still a nice bonus, but not causing dedicated EWAR ships to be obsolete. There may be some wiggle room to increase the TP and disruptor/scram bonuses, but figured we could start conservatively.

This would also create some demand in the amarr/gallente FW LP stores, as amarr seems to have fewer high volume items.

Obviously the new navy geddon would have higher EHP, cap and slots than T1.

Option 3
Add 2 new T1 EWAR battleships to gal/minmatar and 2 new T1 combat battleships for amarr/caldari. This honestly feels more clumsy and might mean CCP needs to create new hulls and balance 4 new ships, instead of repurposing existing ships.

2

When were HACs buffed?

The 15 second “no shoot me” button doesn’t help as much and the Eagle going 2m/s faster - hmm let’s say moderate / little improvement.

But you are correct if by buff you mean price increase by 100%.

3

I would be happy if there was a shield logi battleship, to offset the Nestor for armor. Definitely tilted towards armor in this regard :smirk:

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4

This came up as soon as the battleships were rebalanced way back when. I was in favour of it then and still am.

The phoon with a painter is obvious. Though i wouldn’t use the domi for damps, or even scrams. Its double drone bonus is making it really popular. i still like my damp-hyp idea but i think I’d be decced to kingdom come for seriously suggesting it.

5

Yeah i had a hard time choosing the Gallente BS to use. The way i look at it, the domi being drone focused means it could still have good damage application by switching to lights/mediums. Which wouldnt hurt as much as the mega losing tracking bonus (assuming we went with repurposing the t1 ships).

If we went with the faction BS idea (which i think works a little better) which provides a role bonus to EWAR instead of removing an existing trait, then the t1 and navy domi are unaffected. The navy domi has more mids than the mega, which helps as far as fitting more points/scrams.

Removing either bonus on the hype for an EWAR bonus would cause quite the uproar in solo/small gang, youre quite right about that.

6

Muninn got a substantial buff. The ADCU is a buff no matter how you slice it. 15s is still enough time to land tackle and delay your death while the rest of the gang lands.

Regardless, smaller ships have been getting new hulls and bonuses to play with for the past few years, would be nice to see some changes/additions to the BS line up.

2 Likes
7

The whole BS class requiers attention. And by the way problem with battleships is the indicator of problems with all pvp mechanics and balance. Intruding into E-WAR field only makes situation more complicated.

8

Not really. There are quite a few good battleships that exist now. Its not a problem with battleships as much as it is with capitals. Why fly a battleship (marauder especially) when youve got carriers and dreads that can do effectively the same thing, tank other capitals and have insurance that covers most should you lose it?

Typhoon, mach, tempest, raven, navy raven, hyperion, geddon, apoc all have their uses and are decent ships. Their issue has been cargo, lock range, warp deceleration and scan res (as the most glaring flaws).

Having EWAR role bonuses doesnt complicate anything. Did geddons and scorpions complicate anything? If we go the faction BS option, its a role bonus that is 50% as effective as dedicated EWAR or keeps the current bonuses from the t1 ships (scorp/geddon). You dont have to use it, but its there if you want it. The SNI for example would retain the same bonuses it has now, but if you wanted to use a burst jammer, it would be strength bonused. A typhoon fleet would be bonused for a TP, which is good if you need more application solo, or want to add some tankier support to your gang. If you dont want to use a TP, then dont, nothing else changes with the fleet phoon.

This isnt meant to “fix” battleships, but give more variety for some that arent used as much (navy faction). Just like faction EWAR frigs gave more variety to the frigate meta.

1 Like
9

Honestly I suppose that all E-War things should be alllowed only for cruiser size ships (except Strategic Cruisers).

Though I love Scorpion and Widow, but this restriction will be effective and balanced.

10

While I’m in favor of the idea, I have a problem with the e-war abilities in general. The best way to show this are the frigates:

  • we have the T2 e-war frigates, with long range abilities, designed to be in fleet
  • and we have the navy “e”-war frigates, which are short range and should be efficient in 1v1

Now let’s check the abilities from a bit closer (the “E” stands for “electronic” by the way).
E-war:

  • Gallente: sensor dampening
  • Amarr: weapon disrupting
  • Minmatar: target painting
  • Caldari: ECM

“E”-war:

  • Gallente: warp disruption (this, I think classifies as engineering warfare, propulsion is collateral)
  • Amarr: capacitor warfare (this is clearly engineering)
  • Minmatar: webbing (I’ll just call this propulsion for now)
  • Caldari: … ? (um… guys? I think someone forgot something… again!)

Also, since it was mentioned:

The Nestor shouldn’t have the armor logi ability either, especially not in this current form when you basically need to be in hug distance to make it work at all. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Nestors are being used as instant depots by capitals half of the time.
I think instead of the remote rep, it either should have the BLOPS bonuses (without the shuttle bay), or salvage+tractor beam bonuses to make it an efficient PvE combat explorer similar to the marauders.
Seriously, who designed this ship?

11

Don’t Black Ops have some EWAR traits?

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12

Only the Widow.

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13

CCP has set precedent on having EWAR spread in around in multiple ship classes. You have different gang comps that require different EWAR ships.

You wouldnt bring hyena’s to a huge fleet fight, when you could use huginns/lokis which tank considerably more. If youre running a nano gang, then a hyena might be more useful.

We already have EWAR bonused battleships in the scorp and geddon, as well as the bhaal, barghest, vindicator. So i dont think CCP is going to randomly change all these ships and move them too cruisers only.

14

this shows a basic lack of understanding as to why these ships exist and should not be used as a basis for your desire to add E-war BBS

unlike TD Damps and paints ECM and capacitor war have BB sized modules. For instance even though a lot of people look at the scorpion and think (oh its a big black bird) its bonuses are set up for an entirely different module. This is also why so many people think the scorpion is a useless ship because well if you fit it with normal ECM it is, However if you fit it with an ECM burst you start to see what its actual use is .

You also seem to have not caught on to how E-war works for each Race

Ewar is

gal T1 Damps T2 Point/scram

minm T1 TP T2 Webs

amarr T1 TD T2 Cap warfare

Caldari T1 ECM range T2 ECM power

then you want to take range away from the scorp… you know the ENTIRE POINT.

cruisers handle the role of E-war just fine there is no need for BB sized variants and adding them will only do one of two things. either be overpowered or near useless.

i think your ideas came from a good place but just had a lack of understanding behind them

15

I’m well aware of burst jammers and how they’re used. I’ve flown burst scorps before, but you’re right, removing range bonus from the burst module may not be best. There are 2 easy ways to fix this:

Include the range bonus into the role bonus with ECM strength (if we are going the navy/faction EWAR BS route, which provides a role bonus ontop of the combat bonuses)

or

Buff base range on burst jammer (its really only effective on a scorpion anyway) so it still has a reasonable range.

The original idea was to remove range as we don’t need more ECM ships hiding at the edge of their strength profile. Its a battleship, it needs to be on the front lines, doing damage and bursting ECM/jamming. This goes along with things like the faction EWAR frigs that are all combat orientated with EWAR bonuses (although penalized for range). If you want to be a coward ECM user, use a falcon/rook that can just hover around 100-80km, if you want to burst, then use a scorp and accept you may need to tank a little bit.

As far as racial EWAR goes, you may not have caught on to the points i already made:

Gallente got scram/point range because a sensor damp BS would be idiotic. Its scan res is too low to counter lock other ships that may reduce its targeting range (like keres, lach, falcon etc). Having a long scram or point is useful to a battleship as they are slow and increasing their reach helps them either catch a target (scram) or prevent them from leaving longer (point). No it won’t be as strong as a lach/keres point/scram, and i don’t want to be (it has a battleship tank after all).

Minmatar long webs has already been covered well by the Fleet/T2/T3 variants (hyena, vigil fleet, Loki, rapier/huginn) and blood raiders, which already have a battleship with a web bonus (bhaalgorn). Having a battleship that is bonused for a target painter is good for its own weapons and also means you don’t need to bring a vigil/rapier/huginn etc with your gang to help it apply. Or if you do bring a huginn/rapier, they don’t need to use any mids for a TP and can focus on strictly webs(although they would still have a stronger TP bonus if you really wanted to). Also, as these would be navy/t1 ships, TP aligns with what you already proposed with T1 being bonused for TP, not webs.

As for Caldari, not all Caldari T1 EWAR is range bonused, the griffin is only strength and cap bonused. The kitsune is range bonused. The blackbird is range and strength bonused. Theres a blurring of the lines depending on what CCP originally had in mind when they designed the ship. In my head, the scorp is T1 and a battleship, it should not be yet another ECM ship that sits 40km away, outside of any EWAR counter from the ship its attempting to jam and have a battleship sized tank (or battlecruiser sized tank for that matter, though this would change as it would be the faction variants that got the role bonus).

Amarr is kind of a mixed bag. They have the dragoon which is neut bonused and T1, the curse which is neut bonused (and TD bonused), which is T2 and then the geddon which is neut bonused and T1. I’ll agree, i overlooked the fact that outside the burst jammer, neuts are the only EWAR that has BS/large mods (unless you count heavy scrams/points). I’m not challenging why these ships are here, but more wanting to create a new ship line for all the races to enjoy their EWAR bonuses with battleships.

Why? Because giving battleships some new roles that have previously been held by either frigates or cruisers might help get them out into the wild more. Will make for more unique gang compositions and can even help certain solo fits out. With the faction line that would receive the role bonus, the combat bonuses would be unaffected, so if you don’t want to use the EWAR bonus, you don’t have to, it would not effect the ship’s other combat merits.

16

…

but scram and point range bonus is also already covered just like the web bonus

and the reason BBs don’t have many e-war roles is because they don’t fit the role very well
low tank slow and low scan res do not great E-war ships make. all your idea dose is take currently useful BB and make them worse

17

I don’t think the navy geddon could get any worse. It would make it actually desirable and be an LP sink.

Navy maulus only has a scram bonus. All other ships that are bonused for scrams/points are T2 (or pirate). The Gallente BS would be faction and have both a scram/point bonus (strength slightly lower than T2). There exists a hole where point and scram bonus is not represented in the T1/navy line.

How does a scram/point bonus make a battleship worse? If you PvP, you fit either (or both) inherently. You’re getting a buff for nothing. If you are PvE’ing, then just ignore the role bonus, nothing else is effected.

Remember, i’m not recommending removing either combat bonus, just adding a role bonus for the applicable EWAR. You can’t say “the EWAR bonus that has no direct impact on the combat traits that you can choose to use or not use is making a ship worse”.

Did you say that BS have low tank? Especially navy battleships? I’m confused. Yes, they have low scan res and are slow, but having an EWAR ship that doesn’t get blown off the field when someone targets it does create a niche for them. Especially things like TP/ECM.

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18

but it exists just fine in the pirate line

oooh so your are trying to simple make some OP ewar ships. that tank kick out massive DPS and do E-war

BS don’t have low tank E-WAR ships have low tank to balance the E-war you know because having an E-war ship that tanks hard and can’t be removed from grid is OP.

battle ships are meant to rely on support fleets they themselves do not needs support

and the navy geddon is an extremely powerfull ship it just has a narrow niche there is nothing wrong with that.

19

You mean, the fact their EWAR bonus has already been nerfed? Its not comparable to T2, and they don’t have T2 resists. So do tell how i’m trying to make them OP.

And an EWAR battleship would be supporting a gang, which would be supporting it. Why is this hard to follow?

The navy geddon is trash and you should feel bad for claiming otherwise. Short of AFK POCO bashing, show me a good fit that anyone in a fleet or small gang would use.

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20

great surprise brawler, used them a bit in FW on Ihubs for sniping the ROF bonus put a good deal of pressure on enemy logi when organized correctly, and we use them in LS cruiser gangs as well.(though here we tend to enjoy the standard geddon a bit more)