Given that a carrier has no capabilities to repair snubs, in any large teamfight it is just better to use a battleship instead because its dps by far outweighs the one of carrier and will allow to put off hostile caps way faster. If you have 4 bs vs 2 bs & 2 carriers (assuming that the skill level of players is the same) 4 bs will win. The drones that you can spawn once 60 seconds even with unFLAKable missiles will be torn to pieces in a second by anything, be it a snub/GB/cruiser or anything bigger. We tested their behaviour in conn - they are destroyable by a GB while trying to "dodge" in like 4-5 seconds which is enough for 1 missile launch. Given, that it was that suicide drone - 900k hull damage per 60 seconds - a laughable dps.
More primes can work, but still even a BCR will outpower you easier. Especially with a weak core of a carrier that is depleted fast even by secondaries. In real life, carriers are mobile bases used to harass hostiles while at huge distance. The Battle of Midway is a vivid example. However, the range of drones is 5k which is less than some missiles. The current drone balance can work if the respawn is faster and the distance is bigger.
Overall, if we preserve the current function of carriers - no one gonna play them outside of big battles and those overall would be redundant. Hence, see nothing bad in reverting them to BS (whether modified or not) - at least there will be a demand for them. There might be other options for a carrier - AoE/self/target shield regen at the expense of power core, repairing guns, etc. But with the current dps it just has no use. Especially on missions that most caps farm nowadays because there is little else you can do.
As for the Tempest - the ship used to be very good, now is garbage. I created the whole faction and raised it to officialdom partly due to the willingness of flying the thing. And what do I get? A useless practice dummy for shooting. To wait for a Battleship for the Coalition is like waiting for the second coming of Christ - praised among the believers yet poorly grounded and irrational. Coalition cannot even get their old snubs back even when the models are kinda ready. The whole development is sad and the lack of attention to the faction is partly what drove off my fellow comrades from the faction and made me leave once. I am not hoping that either carriers, and Tempest in particular, will be adequately reworked, or that a Coalition BS will be implemented. Although that is a completely different topic. Hence, reverting carriers back to a subtype of BS (maybe with unique kamikaze-drone missiles or something like that) will be the easiest and most rational solution.
Why do you guys even bother? If devs were listening, Carriers wouldnt be bad right now. Also Tempest wasn't that "good" but it was better than what we have atm.
(11-14-2018, 03:39 PM)Lucas Wrote: Hence I'm suggesting to give them more Primary slots instead of the Heavy ones. If Carriers get their Heavy slots back, then what will happen is that people will tank in the heavier ones again, while having the drone as an extra tool. Or perhaps a heavy slot that cannot use anything but missiles also works for Carriers, to give them a Long-Range tool and to additionally support their Drone while it fights something at a considerable range.
The Atlantis is a neat example of a Carrier in my opinion:
It's got a shape that does not make it impossible to hit, it's got a moderate hull, and most importantly it has many many secondaries which should be a characteristic for Carriers. the Atlantis alone is not a real threat, but an Atlantis defending other Capitalships from incoming bombers while having a Drone on the enemy Capitals can be very annoying to take out.
Giving carriers long range capabilities would likely make battlecruisers redundant. Theoretically in fleet engagememts involving carriers each fleet would rally around it's carrier(s) to protect their fleet's field maintenance functionality as well as the added point defence barrage they would contribute. Though i support your suggestion to keep primaries out of the picture.
How about this, we get rid of the idea of making docking modules a static base interface adaptation and redesign them to merely repair and resupply on interaction. For example, docking woth one will take you out of the universe for 30 seconds and you reappear in space fully regenerated when the time expires.
Cooldowns and bay capacity could also shape this feature as discussed in the OP. Thoughts?
I dislike this suggestion. We shouldn't really be encouraging behaviour that would result in a greater number of unbalanced fights. Imagine if a pro PvP'er like Wesker or whoever fights for half and hour only for a Carrier to rock up and fully resupply him. It is this reason that Bots/Bats became untradable.
I would offer another suggestion or something, but most people know my views on carriers by now.
(11-14-2018, 05:07 PM)Laz Wrote: I dislike this suggestion. We shouldn't really be encouraging behaviour that would result in a greater number of unbalanced fights. Imagine if a pro PvP'er like Wesker or whoever fights for half and hour only for a Carrier to rock up and fully resupply him. It is this reason that Bots/Bats became untradable.
I would offer another suggestion or something, but most people know my views on carriers by now.
(11-14-2018, 05:21 PM)Saronsen Wrote: Balancing gameplay over the actions or skill of one or two players has to be the biggest mistake in development history
On the back of saronsen's comment i'd like to emphasise that the feature is very much a two sided coin. Field maintenance of snubs would just as much help less experienced players against an elite force.
A difference between this suggestion and bots/bats drops is that drops were potentially unlimited to one person. A cap/supply ship could pump their ace with regens and steamroll the competition. Enter the cooldown element (with regard to the carrier or the snub or both). One snub gets one restock/regen per however many minutes or hours. The exact time delay would be chosen with the intent that he/she gets only one per battle.
I actually like this idea of simply adjusting Carriers by giving them unique heavy weapons such as higher refire, lower dps missiles. Missiles aiming to effectively harass BCs while being relatively harmless to smaller caps (in this cases the Carriers numbers of secondaries come in favor again). Gives them a drawback against BSs but boosts their effectiveness against BCs, I mean, just a short thought. It would need to be detailed out and tested etc. but anything better than a shipclass stuck with drones effectively useless in smaller fights.
One option that might be awesome, not sure if it can be coded or enforced by RP rules, but maybe use carriers for a way to allow pvp death to be double elimination rather than single elimination, kinda like a get-out-of-pvp-death free card, that you can only play once per two hours* dock on the carrier before the fight, get exploded in the brawl, launch again from the carrier (if it's still alive), then after you get exploded again, then you're pvp dead.
*30 minutes depending on system, or maybe flatly just 2 hours for carrier respawn
(11-14-2018, 07:37 PM)Silverlight Wrote: I think carriers are kinda a dead class, there's no easy way to make them useful.
Just read Berakhs post, that might actually not be a bad idea. Carriers engage line is a respawn of a limited number of snubs?
Carrier provides 1X respawn.
+1
A half good idea that is easily to implement but hard to keep track of. Especially in a fleet engagement where engagement messages are flying all over the place.
It'd be good to arrive at a substantial solution as opposed to relying on a technicality to do justice to carriers. They need to change.