You know you're a bitter vet when...

You read a dev post about new skills that allows a jump clone timer reduction and more jump clones, and your reaction flips between:

1)  Stockholm Syndrome:  Thank you CCP! Thank you!

2) Utter rage:  This game is 10 plus years old and ONLY NOW they're getting around to this?!

State Of The FPS

I used to be a hardcore FPS player in the days of Quake III and Unreal Tournament 1999, sadly I've been so spoiled by the UT99 movement system and weapons that nothing has come close since to the adrenaline rush I'd experienced during ladder matches.

Such a bout of nostalgia didn't come without warning.  A game that had looked promising, Payday 2, took a nosedive in my interest level once I found out a little bit more about the mechanics the developers had chosen to implement.

It has a leveling system which unlocks perks/talents, a reputation system for unlocking weapons, a random map/mission/difficulty system, and a random loot drop system for weapon mods.

The reason the above system for me thinking, and quite angry, is my very real concern that the unlock/leveling mechanic is there to prolong an otherwise shallow game.  That is, if everyone were max level, all weapon and mods to choose from, any map and difficulty to select, would anyone still be playing?

Take the Call of Duty experience:  I found that the prestige system prevented me from seriously trying to master a weapon beyond what would get me to the next prestige, and once I hit max prestige and everything was unlocked I found the game rather uninteresting.

The experience and unlock mechanic functioning as a Skinner Box to keep me playing rather than being genuinely interesting in its own right.

Nevermind the fact that I paid $X for a game and now I needed to play a considerable amount to simply have full access to all the options?  I thought I unlocked it when I paid for it?

Compared to the UT series or Quake where everyone was on (relatively) equal footing with regard to weapons/items from the get go and player skill expressed through said weapons without an artificial "reset" made for a competitive environment without leveling imposed restrains.

/end rant

Anatomy of an Engagment: Rifter versus Merlin

Pre-post Mini-rant: Autocannons suck. Relatively low DPS made even worse by almost certainly fighting in falloff. Selectable damage type is great until you realize other comparable ship fits do around 50% or better raw DPS and the raw DPS loss for that selectable damage type is not offset by the subsequent resist holes (less so if the resist hole is plugged as is often the case). So yeah, I'm lamenting autocannons, though these days of T1 vs T1 engagements has me wondering if they were ever really that strong in the first place.

Non-Minmatar ships suffered a great deal prior to the ship rebalance due to poor powergrid/CPU and mediocre ship bonuses. These have been "fixed" on the frigate/destroyer/cruiser level and will soon be addressed on the battlecruiser level on up.

So yeah, I'm not too enthused with autocannons at the moment. Artillery on the other hand...

/end rant

So, the fight.

First, the fits:

[Rifter, Bud Good's Rifter] Gyrostabilizer II Damage Control II 400mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I Limited 1MN Afterburner I J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I Balmer Series Tracking Disruptor I 125mm Gatling AutoCannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S 125mm Gatling AutoCannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S 125mm Gatling AutoCannon II,Republic Fleet EMP S Small Anti-Explosive Pump I Small Anti-Kinetic Pump I Small Projectile Burst Aerator I

and


[Merlin, Merlin]
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Micro Auxiliary Power Core II

Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator
Medium F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction

Light Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
Light Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S
Light Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge S

Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I


First thing you should notice is the obvious disparity in propulsion mods. My Merlin is MWD fit, which almost certainly ensures that my prop mod will be off when it gets into a brawl. My reasoning is that as long as I can project damage out to scram range I can out brawl anything I encounter. Secondly, if the other ship is trying to escape I can overheat my scram and spam my MWD hoping that my opponent either hasn't overheated his scram or isn't aligned out, thus allowing me to get an MWD burst in to close the range.

So, how'd this play out? The Rifter was in a novice plex, I warped into the plex to find the Rifter 4km off the warp in and immediately scrammed and TD'd. Having anticipated the Rifter to kite, I had Null loaded and overheated. What I wasn't anticipating was the TD, this knocked my range to 5km with Null, all I could do at this point was hit approach and hope my TD'd DPS would be enough to destroy the Rifter before he destroyed me as I had no hope of disengaging (hence part of the point of MWDs, isn't it?).

To my surprise my base speed was enough to catch up to the AB fit Rifter and started getting some solid hits in at around 4km where he crumpled fairly quickly.

http://eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=16335332

I believed I shouldn't have won that fight unless I had an opportunity to get to 0 on him and apply enough DPS before he is able to pull range.  Warping into the plex where he gets to dictate the initial tackle range is a crapshoot at best.

The first thing I noticed on his fit? The 400mm plate and triple armor rigs.

Next? He left his TD unscripted which meant that only half as much range reduction was inflicted on my Merlin.

Finally, his fit had the smallest autocannons available which meant his optimal+falloff is somewhere around 5km, pretty short. Granted, he did have a gyro and burst rig, but those do nothing to extend your range when trying to kite.

Now, given the meta of lowsec FW AB short range frigates, I can't imagine that fit succeeding against my usual AB Merlin. Closing range and applying overheated CNAM DPS to the tune of 240 or so would have ended the fight that much sooner.

Some thoughts on range

Engagement Range

This is something that's been on my mind for a couple weeks now that I've been meaning to make into a blog post.

So there's a few ranges engagements tend to fall into. In order of distance, close to far (note that while this is frigate oriented, the criteria for cruisers and above is similar, the ranges adjust to meet the longer ranges on all cruiser/battleship modules save points and webs):

1) Roshambo Range: <500m stationary.

This is where you're attempting to get as close as possible to your target and apply as much DPS as possible, taking max DPS from your opponent, fingers crossed you can destroy your opponent before he can destroy you.

2) LOLtracking Range: Orbit <500m.

This is similar to Roshambo Range except where you're attempting to break the hit quality of your opponent by (preferably) manually orbiting as tight an orbit as you can. Most viable when you have superior tracking, a web and your opponent doesn't have a web. This is preferable for some active tank and nos fits.

3) Small Nos/Neut range: <6000m

This is the range where you're attempting to buy enough time for your nos/neut to do its thing while minimizing incoming turret based DPS, the idea being that if you're running a nos+rep, you lower incoming DPS and outlast your opponent. Similarly with neuts against cap using weapons (hybrids and lasers), turning off your opponents weapons or giving their active tank trouble.

4) Scram range kiting: 6600m-9000m.

Pretty straightforward. Outrange small Nos/Neuts while still being able to apply your own DPS.

5) Warp Disruptor Kiting: 13km-28.8km.

The range on this varies slightly (but significantly) based on the Warp Disruptor fitted. Meta Warp Disruptors are limited to 13-20km/24km (overheated), T2 Warp Disruptors to 13km-24km/28.8km (overheated). Imperial Navy Slicers tend to fall into this category as well as kiting cruisers such as the Shield Rupture and Shield Stabber/Stabber Fleet Issue.

Beyond 28.8km is a skirmish range that generally relies on long range weaponry up to sniper set ups that are at 70km+.

Range Control:

This article would be incomplete without a discussion on range control, or how ships are able to change the engagement range.

Generally speaking, the faster ship, properly flown, is able to dictate the engagement envelope. There are obvious exceptions: a kite fit Imperial Navy Slicer dictates range up to the point where it's scrammed and webbed.

Activating a gate into a FW plex is a crapshoot as to how far away your opponent is and therefore how many range control modules you could be subjected to, be it superior speed, scram, or web.

Now, that range control must be taken in context of your ships gank and tank. In other words, fit a point that suits your weapons engagement range. It's pointless (pun intended) to fit a 24km T2 Warp Disruptor if you're running small autocannons. The exception to this is where you're flying a long point MWD frigate attempted to hold point for your gang, with that fit the short range weapons are suitable for dealing with drones.

Piloting skill:

This is the wildcard factor. Tricks like slingshotting to scram or escape, flying in a straight line to minimize transversal/the effect of TDs, crashing to zero range with an overheated prop mod, all can play a significant role in how an engagement plays out.

I'll be covering the how's and whys in a later blog post.