Greetings everyone. I was and still am really excited about this upcoming release but what I’ve seen so far on the Test Server has me more worried than happy for the changes that are coming at the end of May.
I am going to explain in this post my hopes, my fears and my expectations and warn everyone reading this, that it is heavily biased towards my own ideal of how EVE should be.
Let‘s directly jump into it with the new PvE Content delivered to us:
Abyssal Deadspace Pockets
The Abyssal Deadspace finally delivers to us things we need in EVE fresh content for those who enjoy PvE Content and Challenges, sadly the way these sites are right now, they feel more like the same old with minor changes in the AI and increased HP numbers. Meh.
The Main issues I have with Abyssal Deadspace are:
- NPC behaviour
- Noninteractive Timer
- NPC spawns (Bulletsponges and way too many drones)
- Structure spawns
- Loot aquisition
The NPCs are affected the same way as us players from the various effects, yet the Drifter BS, with it‘s set orbit range will leave the safe zone without taking damage, making it impossible for short range weapons to keep attacking them – This is in no way anything that has to do with being challenging and far from being fun.
The Timer is a quite good idea but the implementation is very flawed in my opinion. Having a Timer tick down and poof you‘re dead. Not fun.
Why not allow the player to have an influence on it? It is stated that the space is collapsing so make it stabilize by removing signatures from it, every kill should slightly increase the time remaining on the Timer.
An other way would be to increase the Timer every time you enter a new pocket, this of course would be coupled to a shorter initial Timer. Even adding both those changes together would not remove the dread of dying a horrible death, it would simply allow the Players to actively fight their fate.Let‘s come to the NPC Spawns. Bulletsponges are not fun. If you manage to web down the Drifter BS and shoot it, it should die sooner rather than later. Sitting on top of it for multiple minutes is, in my opinion, neither very challenging nor a lot of fun. So I‘d suggest reducing the amount of HP these ships have (Especially once you consider the effects of the Plasma Fire Storm and how much that further increases the amount of HP you have to burn through), but increasing the number of enemies, at least for the lower Tier Dungeons.
For the higher Tier ones, I still think the base HP Numbers have to be reduced not because it is too hard, but because it gets rather boring.The drone swarms are another issue. While they are not a problem when there is an Automata Suppressor Structure (Great addition to the game, interactive structures, I love it), having to kill swarms of hard to hit ships can be annoying. Especially so if you’ve had one spawn in every single pocket.
I‘d suggest adding a hard cap on how many times you can encounter them per dungeon, or couple them with a definite spawn of Signature Increase Cloud, Automata Suppressors or Multibody Tracking Pylons (All of which should please spawn within the area). This would at least provide a way to counter them for people who did not have the luxury to bring a web.This also already goes right into my next issue with these sites. The structure spawns outside the arena. Why? Don‘t really have to add anything else to this topic, CCP Lease fix this.
Last thing about the Abyssal Deadspace Pockets I have is that the aquisition of loot feels outlandish. You enter this big dark space, and of course there sits a Research Lab right next to the Gate and everything else doesn’t give any loot.
I‘d prefer getting different loot from different kinds of things. Having a Research Lab in one of the sites is okay, having it drop BPCs or Plasmids is too. But why aren’t the Drifters, Triglavians and Drones giving us any loot. Wouldn’t it make more sense to aquire the filaments from those ships?
The last point is less of a gameplay issue though and more one of immersion, so feel free to ignore it.
The one other thing I wanted to talk about are the new:
Triglavian Spacebeauties
The Main Issues with them are:
- Roles
- Slotlayout
- Fitting
- Weapon System
I love the idea of having a ship that is basically forced into Shield or Armor, especially because people will find a way to make it work with the thing it is not intended to, at some point.
But I cannot see them perform well in the Roles that they were intended to. The Frigate is forced to be kitey, but it lacks the speed and agility to be effective at it, especially since you have to start stacking your damage again everytime someone just slightly drifts out of your range.
The Cruiser is probably the only one I can see working, the way it is right now but even then the Slotlayout and the roles aren’t really adding up.
And now for the big bad Leshak. I want to love it, but the way it is on SiSi I just can‘t.
It‘s too slow to be threatening, the Damage is really nothing worth mentioning, compared to a Hyperion for example and all the Role bonuses on it are basically wasted because it is limited in so many ways by the puny amount of fitting one has left after equipping it with an Entropic Disruptor.For every single one of these Ships, I would suggest removing 1 High Slot and moving it to a Mid. Or simply adding an additional Mid Slot. Just to give Players the ability to adapt to their ship to multiple situations.
For the Fitting issues, I‘m sure those can be absolved by simply changing the requirements of the ED Module but I still think PG and CPU are way too tight on them.
I see the point of them not being intended for Fleets, but they should at least be viable in situations where they are alone or in a small gang.Using the Leshak as an example here.
Fitting a weapon and 2 Heavy Neuts already leaves you with barely 1.5k PG and 370 CPU to fit in 2 Highs 4 Meds and 8 Lowslots.Finally the Myth, the Meme, the 50 Second long period before you finally start dealing Damage,
The Entropic Disruptor.Rarely have I been so looking forward to a change in EVE as to this new module, but I must say, it is quite underwhelming in the state it is right now. Technically speaking it looks really good on paper. But considering how incredibly weak it is to so many forms of EWAR I really do not think it is even remotely strong enough.
A TD with optimal range script, jamming, ECM burst, Sensor Dampening, swapping Ammo or going for a new target after you actually killed something. (Not actually opposed to damage reset on kill)
All of it will most likely end up with you having to restart cycling your gun. And start anew.
Why not allow the accumulated stats to decay (rather fast) when not firing or increasing the rate of fire (and reducing the damage dealt per tick) so that you can get back to your stacks faster.I‘d really appreciate if people would look more into how to make this module an interesting addition to the game, and not something that ends up with only the fringe use of bashing structures.
If anyone is actually still reading, I want to also talk about the most controversial topic:
The RNG Loot-Slotmachine
First of all, I think it is a bad idea, but not irredeemable.
I‘d rather CCP create fix Versions of Items, that can be rolled by using a Plasmid onto an Item.
I‘m going to try and show it with the example of a Medium Armor Repairer II
Using the Worst Plasmid on a Non-Faction/Deadspace Module should give the player a chance to get an item from a loot table that ranges from worst possible to better than the original Module.
These Modules could be named similar to the new BCUs we got recently, giving it an acronym for the affected stats and a Letter indicating the severity as well as a Tier Indicator.
I‘d also limit the amount of attributes that could be affected by the Plasmids, especially the lower tiered ones.
Limiting the best Items to those, willing to risk the highest level Plasmids and Deadspace Items as Ingredients. (Even with the best Ingredients you should still have even the worst items in the loot table)This would probably result in 50-60 new modules per category, but they all would still be able to be sold on the market. And they could be individually balanced.
This would greatly reduce the change of things getting totally out of hand.
I don‘t want to see people using Huginns to web others from 120km+.
I am not sure if I managed to get all my points across in a way everyone can understand, so feel free to ask me questions. Sadly English is not my native language, so if I made any grammar mistakes I am sorry.
This also got way longer than I anticipated.
And yes I am aware that things aren’t final yet and most likely subject to change. But I love this game and I want to continue playing it so let me be paranoid a bit, OK?
Regards
Cloud