CCP Rise published his ideas about industrial rebalancing. I seriously doubt he ever flown one (except as a bait). He creates two industrials for each race: a tanky and a large-hold one. The remaining Iterons will be foster children.
His ideas don't address the fundamental industrial problem: they are all stepping stones. The Caracal isn't just a stepping stone of the Raven and the Tengu. It needs the same skills and runs well on lower level, so someone who learns for a Raven or Tengu usually plays with a Caracal until he gets there. But the point is that after he can fly a Tengu or Raven and even have these ships, he still has reasons to fly a Caracal. CFC often sends fleets of them to Fountain. The Caracal is a ship on its own right, not just a stepping stone flied only by newbies. On the other hand the industrials, even with the rebalance are worse than the Orca in every aspect. Even the new "tanky" hauler has less EHP than an Orca and even if you take the paper-thin T1, fill it with cargo expanders and rigs, it'll have less cargo space than a max tanked Orca.
I think the reason why CCP Rise doesn't see the problem is the fundamental difference between industrial ships an combat ships. A combat ship can accomplish its mission despite dead. If you are defending your system with Caracals, dying and reshipping 10 times but saving the timer, you won. If you shot just one Tengu while losing 10 Caracals, you even won the ISK war. Also if you just want fun, roaming in a band of Caracals will do: you'll have fun despite you'll return as a new clone. This creates a position for cheap ships for veteran players.
On the other hand if an industrial dies, it failed its mission in every aspect. It lost the cargo and made its owner sad. No industrial pilot who did industry (and not comedy fleet or baiting) was ever having fun in a fight. Even if you survive a gank attempt it's not "yeah I won, I'm the man" but "Thank you Jesus!". The purpose of an industrial pilot is to transport valuable cargo, so making the ship cheap doesn't help with the loss. If you don't care about your cargo, you don't transport it, but reprocess and sell it to a buy order. An industrial pilot will pick the safest ship that can do the job. In highsec it's the Orca or a Freighter, in other spaces it's the Covops hauler or the Jump Freighter. After they can fly these, they will fly only these. If the situation is too hot for even these ships, he doesn't fly anything and saves his cargo until it's safer. T1 industrials and even the "deep space transport" are obsolete ships flied only by newbies who can't fly or can't afford the "proper" ship.
To give a reason of existence to T1 industrials, you must give them a role where they beat the Orca, Freigher, JF or Covops. Let me offer some ideas:
His ideas don't address the fundamental industrial problem: they are all stepping stones. The Caracal isn't just a stepping stone of the Raven and the Tengu. It needs the same skills and runs well on lower level, so someone who learns for a Raven or Tengu usually plays with a Caracal until he gets there. But the point is that after he can fly a Tengu or Raven and even have these ships, he still has reasons to fly a Caracal. CFC often sends fleets of them to Fountain. The Caracal is a ship on its own right, not just a stepping stone flied only by newbies. On the other hand the industrials, even with the rebalance are worse than the Orca in every aspect. Even the new "tanky" hauler has less EHP than an Orca and even if you take the paper-thin T1, fill it with cargo expanders and rigs, it'll have less cargo space than a max tanked Orca.
I think the reason why CCP Rise doesn't see the problem is the fundamental difference between industrial ships an combat ships. A combat ship can accomplish its mission despite dead. If you are defending your system with Caracals, dying and reshipping 10 times but saving the timer, you won. If you shot just one Tengu while losing 10 Caracals, you even won the ISK war. Also if you just want fun, roaming in a band of Caracals will do: you'll have fun despite you'll return as a new clone. This creates a position for cheap ships for veteran players.
On the other hand if an industrial dies, it failed its mission in every aspect. It lost the cargo and made its owner sad. No industrial pilot who did industry (and not comedy fleet or baiting) was ever having fun in a fight. Even if you survive a gank attempt it's not "yeah I won, I'm the man" but "Thank you Jesus!". The purpose of an industrial pilot is to transport valuable cargo, so making the ship cheap doesn't help with the loss. If you don't care about your cargo, you don't transport it, but reprocess and sell it to a buy order. An industrial pilot will pick the safest ship that can do the job. In highsec it's the Orca or a Freighter, in other spaces it's the Covops hauler or the Jump Freighter. After they can fly these, they will fly only these. If the situation is too hot for even these ships, he doesn't fly anything and saves his cargo until it's safer. T1 industrials and even the "deep space transport" are obsolete ships flied only by newbies who can't fly or can't afford the "proper" ship.
To give a reason of existence to T1 industrials, you must give them a role where they beat the Orca, Freigher, JF or Covops. Let me offer some ideas:
- Sigil, Badger, Wreathe, Iteron: they are designated noobships, they all cost about 0.5M, on a resaonable fit, they can carry about 4000m3 and tank about 10K.
- Bestover: tanky highsec hauler. 4000m3 cargohold without expanders but no one would put expanders on it but armor tank. Fully tanked it has 300K EHP.
- Hoarder: wormhole hauler. 200m/s while flying under T2 cloak (can't warp cloaked). Bonused for scanners.
- Mammoth: combat hauler. Bonus to salvage cycle speed (not strength), can fit both armor and shield tanks (enough slots and powergrid), but cannot fit cargohold expanders. 100K tank with good fittings, 3000m3 cargohold, with proper fittings 1000m/s, 5 secs align. Its purpose is to fly with fleets, loot and salvage.
- Badger II: relic/data site hauler: automatically collects the loot from the loot-explosion.
- Iteron 2,3,4: specialized haulers: they can carry about 50k m3 of various kind of items: ore, PI, fuel.
- Iteron 5: like today, the baby-freighter, the last stepping stone before the big ones.
- The 4 currently useless "deep space transports" would become useful again if they got interdiction nullifying bonus and some more warp stab bonuses as +2 won't save you in the world of +2 long points. I'd take the the +2 strength and give +100% effect from warp core stabilizers, allowing them to have 10 warp strength if filled with 5 warpstabs.
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