Thread: Developers Blog

I am proud to announce that this winter, we are going to release some long-anticipated ship balancing. Specifically, capital ship balancing.

For a long time, there has been an outcry in the community that fleet fights are stagnating and are just not as fun as they should be. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of pages of forum threads dedicated to this subject both on the official EVE Online forums, other EVE forums, as well as in blogs and articles. There is no shortage of opinions on this subject from players, devs and CSM members; the main concern that has been stated over and over again is that the proliferation of supercapitals is mostly to blame. Supercapitals can effectively deal with any size of target, and killing them takes a tremendous amount of damage. What this means is that with very few exceptions, the fleet with the most supercarriers wins. Huge, expensive ships should obviously be powerful, but there needs to be a way to fight back.

While not everyone agrees that supercarriers are to blame for everything, there were some issues that kept popping up:

• Supercapitals are too hard to kill.
• Supercarriers are far too versatile.
• The Titan superweapon is too powerful.
• Dreadnoughts are not good enough.
• Remote ECM Bursts should not work on ships immune to ewar.
• Sub-capitals are useless in fleet fights.

Supercapitals are too hard to kill

We wanted to make them a little bit weaker, but not gut them completely. We're doing a simple 20% reduction in Shield, Armor and Hull hitpoints on both supercarriers and titans.

Supercarriers are far too versatile

The reason that supercarriers can deal with any size of ship is the versatility provided by its massive drone bay. Having access to almost unlimited combat drones of all sizes and being able to launch 20 of them at a time means that they have an answer to almost any situation. In fact, we found that drones on capital ships in general to be detrimental to the way fleet fights should work. If you want to deal with sub-capitals, you should bring your own sub-capitals or a carrier. Supercarriers will now have a smaller drone bay and will only be able to put fighters and fighter bombers in it. We are increasing the signature resolution on fighters so that they deal less damage to smaller targets. We are also completely removing the drone bays of titans and dreadnoughts. Seeing as we didn't want to take damage away from dreadnoughts, we're boosting the damage bonus of Siege Module I to compensate for the loss of drones. The Moros had its drone bonus changed to a capital hybrid turret rate of fire bonus.

The Titan superweapon is too powerful

Once we decided to reduce the capabilities of the supercarriers, we had to make sure that the "supercapital blob" wouldn't simply be replaced by the "titan blob." This meant that we had to do something about the superweapons. The big problem with the superweapons is that they can take out the crucial logistics and command ships of the opposing fleet in the first few minutes of a fleet fight, which severely reduces the capabilities of any remaining sub-capital ships. To fix this, we are changing the superweapon so that it cannot fire upon sub-capital ships (capital ships being Freighters, Jump Freighters, Carriers, Dreadnoughts, Capital Industrial Ships, Supercarriers and Titans).

Dreadnoughts are not good enough

One of the biggest problems with dreadnoughts is the fact that you have to commit them for 10 minutes at a time with siege mode. We are shortening the duration of Siege Module I from 10 minutes to 5 minutes and cutting the Strontium Clathrate cost in half. Dreadnoughts in siege mode will also no longer be affected by Remote ECM Burst. There was some discussion about boosting the dreadnoughts further, but we want to see how they play out with the other capital changes first.

Sub-capitals are useless in fleet fights

The changes we're making should have a big impact here. Capital ships will have fewer drones to attack sub-capitals. Fighters will deal less damage to sub-capitals. Superweapons won't be able to shoot sub-capitals. Supercarriers will have fewer reserve fighters and fighterbombers, so having your sub-caps take down fighters and fighter bombers will have more of an impact on the fight.

Logging off should not be a viable tactic

Then there are the logoff mechanics. When you log off your character in space, the ship you are piloting disappears after 15 minutes. This, coupled with the millions of hitponts that supercapitals have, means that very few supercapitals are actually being destroyed. When a fleet is losing a large supercapital fight, they can simply log everyone off and be confident that they enemy fleet will only have enough time to kill a handful of their supercapitals. This kind of meta-gaming is not only un-fun but it just doesn't make much sense. When you commit your ship to a battle that should actually be a commitment. Only by winning or by making a tactical, well planned retreat should your ship be able to survive. It has been said that spaceships are serious business and they damn well should be. We are changing the logoff mechanics in such a way that as long as your enemies are actively engaged in fighting you, logging off is not going to save your ship.

The end. Except it's not the end at all.

As a part of our efforts to refocus towards FiS, these balancing changes are going to be the first of many, making sure that we continually balance and shake up EVE for years to come.

In conclusion, here is a full list of the changes we're making.

Supercarriers

• Drone bay can only hold fighters and fighter bombers.
• Reduce Shield, Armor and Hull hitpoints on all Supercarriers by 20%.
• Reduce drone capacity.
  
  • Aeon, Revenant and Wyvern: 125000 (25 total Fighters + Fighter Bombers)
  • Hel and Nyx: 150000 (30 total Fighters + Fighter Bombers)
  
  
• Remote ECM Burst: Does not affect ships that are immune to electronic warfare (Supercarriers, Titans, Triaged Carriers and Sieged Dreads)

Fighters

• Increase signature resolution to 400. (This change has been cancelled due to feedback from the EVE community)
  

Dreadnoughts

• Remove drone bay from all dreadnoughts.
• Siege Module I: Boost damage bonus from 625% to 700% to compensate for loss of drones.
• Siege Module I: Duration time reduced to 5 minutes. Fuel cost -50%.
• Moros: Remove drone bonus.
• Moros: New bonus: 5% bonus to Capital Hybrid Turret rate of fire per level.

Titans

• Remove drone bay from all titans.
• Reduce Shield, Armor and Hull hitpoints by 20%.
• Superweapon: Cannot shoot sub-capital ships.

Logoff timer

• After a player logs out, there is a check for player aggression every 15 minutes. If you have been aggressed, the timer extends for 15 minutes; if you have not been aggressed, you disappear as before. Note: this is only for player aggression and will not change what happens when you log off during fights against NPCs.

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As we have hinted at, the Tornado is warping into the 2011 winter expansion...and it‘s bringing friends.

We couldn‘t just give the Minmatar a new ship and leave the other factions out (NPC military escalation doesn’t work like that), so, in the spririt of mutually assured destruction, each of the factions have sent their best engineers and scientists to the drafting boards and will also be rolling out a new tier 3 battlecruiser.
„But isn‘t the Tornado a battleship?“
According to the original concept it was, yes. But when reviewing the armadas of existing ships we came to the conclusion that it would make much more sense to add another tier of battlecruisers instead of a fourth battleship tier, and that the accessibility of bc skills would mean more of these ships might be in the hands of younger, brasher pilots. That means more pew pew pew overall.
What sets these new battlecruisers apart from their lower tier cousins?
The most unique thing about them is that they will be able to fit battleship-sized weapons. Yes, you heard correctly... battlecruisers with oversized guns.
They will be capable of similar damage output as a battleship but obviously all that damage comes at a price.They won‘t be able to tank like a battleship, but what they lack in the tanking department the right pilot should be able to somewhat make up for with speed and distance management. Those looking to start minmaxing fleets of TÖTALHELLDEATH will have to wait a bit for the stats.

The concept is; violent, fast and fun.
In the following weeks we will be introducing the Tornado‘s three counterparts. Stay tuned!


More...

As we have hinted at, the Tornado is warping into the 2011 winter expansion...and it‘s bringing friends.

We couldn‘t just give the Minmatar a new ship and leave the other factions out (NPC military escalation doesn’t work like that), so, in the spririt of mutually assured destruction, each of the factions have sent their best engineers and scientists to the drafting boards and will also be rolling out a new tier 3 battlecruiser.
„But isn‘t the Tornado a battleship?“
According to the original concept it was, yes. But when reviewing the armadas of existing ships we came to the conclusion that it would make much more sense to add another tier of battlecruisers instead of a fourth battleship tier, and that the accessibility of bc skills would mean more of these ships might be in the hands of younger, brasher pilots. That means more pew pew pew overall.
What sets these new battlecruisers apart from their lower tier cousins?
The most unique thing about them is that they will be able to fit battleship-sized weapons. Yes, you heard correctly... battlecruisers with oversized guns.
They will be capable of similar damage output as a battleship but obviously all that damage comes at a price.They won‘t be able to tank like a battleship, but what they lack in the tanking department the right pilot should be able to somewhat make up for with speed and distance management. Those looking to start minmaxing fleets of TÖTALHELLDEATH will have to wait a bit for the stats.

The concept is; violent, fast and fun.
In the following weeks we will be introducing the Tornado‘s three counterparts. Stay tuned!


New to EVE? Start your 14-day free trial today.
Returning pilot? Visit Account Management for the latest offers and promotions.



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As we have hinted at, the Tornado, originally designed by dreamwa1ker from Deviant Art (Pattern Clarc in EVE), is warping into the 2011 winter expansion...and it‘s bringing friends.

We couldn‘t just give the Minmatar a new ship and leave the other factions out (NPC military escalation doesn’t work like that), so, in the spririt of mutually assured destruction, each of the factions have sent their best engineers and scientists to the drafting boards and will also be rolling out a new tier 3 battlecruiser.
„But isn‘t the Tornado a battleship?“
According to the original concept it was, yes. But when reviewing the armadas of existing ships we came to the conclusion that it would make much more sense to add another tier of battlecruisers instead of a fourth battleship tier, and that the accessibility of bc skills would mean more of these ships might be in the hands of younger, brasher pilots. That means more pew pew pew overall.
What sets these new battlecruisers apart from their lower tier cousins?
The most unique thing about them is that they will be able to fit battleship-sized weapons. Yes, you heard correctly... battlecruisers with oversized guns.
They will be capable of similar damage output as a battleship but obviously all that damage comes at a price.They won‘t be able to tank like a battleship, but what they lack in the tanking department the right pilot should be able to somewhat make up for with speed and distance management. Those looking to start minmaxing fleets of TÖTALHELLDEATH will have to wait a bit for the stats.

The concept is; violent, fast and fun.
In the following weeks we will be introducing the Tornado‘s three counterparts. Stay tuned!


New to EVE? Start your 14-day free trial today.
Returning pilot? Visit Account Management for the latest offers and promotions.



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Following the announcement by CCP Manifest on Wednesday, October 19 concerning the goals of CCP and the downsizing of staff, it became clear to many players that the EVE Community team was one of those affected. The loss of our colleagues, friends and mentors has saddened us greatly and we wish them all the very best for the future.
So what is happening with the Community team now? Will players see less communication from CCP on the development of EVE?
Absolutely not. The Community team has merged with Customer Support to create the Customer Relations wing of CCP. Hilmar, the CEO of CCP, recently stated in an interview with Eurogamer, ‘ By centralizing customer support and community we have more people doing community work than we did before. Being co-located with the developers allows the information within the community groups to have a much more direct effect on the development process.’ The Community team are now located in our Reykjavik office and will be working closely with every development team to ensure that players are kept up to date with what is coming to EVE.
Over the next couple of weeks we will bring you a series of short video blogs which will focus on work in progress and what is in development for EVE Online. We will be increasing our communication with players on the EVE forums, EVE Twitter and EVE Facebook pages, and making sure that the increased communication momentum you’ve witnessed is maintained. We will be working closely with all departments to bring you Dev Blogs, expansion notes and up to date news. We are going to open Russian and German forum sections to help support our localized clients. We will maintain close relationships with our Fansites and be available to talk to them as usual. Several weeks ago we also started planning for the return of a volunteer moderator program. This plan is still in the design stage and we hope to bring you a blog on it in the coming weeks. The new volunteer moderator team will have a different role than before and will not be in a position to ban other players accounts or see any alts. We understand that this is something players are concerned about so we will be providing you with a very in depth blog explaining their role over the coming weeks.
CCP Guard, CCP Shadow, CCP Spitfire, CCP Phantom and myself are here and committed to providing you with the best level of service. We will maintain a high profile in all sections of the forums and will monitor for issues that are effecting your game play and report them to the correct department. We will gather feedback on issues which players are passionate about and send them to the teams responsible.
We would like to thank you in advance for your support while we work through these difficult times.
The EVE Community team.


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Returning pilot? Visit Account Management for the latest offers and promotions.




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Originally Posted by CivilWars

Might be time to train BC5.

That's an affirmative

Following the announcement by CCP Manifest on Wednesday, October 19 concerning the goals of CCP and the downsizing of staff, it became clear to many players that the EVE Community team was one of those affected. The loss of our colleagues, friends and mentors has saddened us greatly and we wish them all the very best for the future.
So what is happening with the Community team now? Will players see less communication from CCP on the development of EVE?
Absolutely not. The Community team has merged with Customer Support to create the Customer Relations wing of CCP. Hilmar, the CEO of CCP, recently stated in an interview with Eurogamer, ‘ By centralizing customer support and community we have more people doing community work than we did before. Being co-located with the developers allows the information within the community groups to have a much more direct effect on the development process.’ The Community team are now located in our Reykjavik office and will be working closely with every development team to ensure that players are kept up to date with what is coming to EVE.
Over the next couple of weeks we will bring you a series of short video blogs which will focus on work in progress and what is in development for EVE Online. We will be increasing our communication with players on the EVE forums, EVE Twitter and EVE Facebook pages, and making sure that the increased communication momentum you’ve witnessed is maintained. We will be working closely with all departments to bring you Dev Blogs, expansion notes and up to date news. We are going to open Russian and German forum sections to help support our localized clients. We will maintain close relationships with our Fansites and be available to talk to them as usual. Several weeks ago we also started planning for the return of a volunteer moderator program. This plan is still in the design stage and we hope to bring you a blog on it in the coming weeks. The new volunteer moderator team will have a different role than before and will not be in a position to ban other players accounts or see any alts. We understand that this is something players are concerned about so we will be providing you with a very in depth blog explaining their role over the coming weeks.
CCP Guard, CCP Shadow, CCP Spitfire, CCP Phantom and myself are here and committed to providing you with the best level of service. We will maintain a high profile in all sections of the forums and will monitor for issues that are effecting your game play and report them to the correct department. We will gather feedback on issues which players are passionate about and send them to the teams responsible.
We would like to thank you in advance for your support while we work through these difficult times.
The EVE Community team.


New to EVE? Start your 14-day free trial today.
Returning pilot? Visit Account Management for the latest offers and promotions.




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The four price indices of New Eden have been calculated for September 2011. For more detail on the indices, please refer to the Market Indices page on Evelopedia.
Prices of PI made POS fuel rise by 15% from last month. The index blog for August mentioned the negative correlation between the prices of PI made POS fuel and ice products. Sure enough, this month sees ice product prices decline, but only by a meager 1.4%. This is less than one would expect, were it not for the entrepreneurial spirit of the Goons, who started disincentivizing the production of oxygen isotopes near the end of the month, through suicide ganking of the mining barges that supply it. This market is clearly the one to watch for October.
Datacore prices continue to rise for the second month in row. The price level is now close to what it was in May. This suggests that the effect of the agent changes in June on datacore supply were mostly temporary, or that any long term effect is rather small.
Sometimes, the price history, from which we calculate the price indices, washes ashore some interesting remnants from the past. Guardian-Vexors are an improved version of the Vexor that entered the game in connection with a live event in 2004. Recently, a Guardian-Vexor cruiser was traded on the market. This is the first time we see it in our logs for many years. Back in the days, it sold for 500 million ISK, having risen from an initial price of 50 million in the first trade. However, the price of this latest transaction was just under 40 billion. That‘s close to the construction cost of a titan.
Another interesting collector‘s item that regularly pops up in the logs is Astronautic Engineering. This skill claims to allow research and production in the field, but in reality it does absolutely nothing. It was introduced to the market by mistake in August 2007, originally sold by NPCs for 10 million, and withdrawn 2 weeks later. The withdrawal made this entirely useless skill a collector‘s item, which now sells for over 5 billion. So far this year, the skill has been traded 27 times on the market. The rising value of this item is depicted in the graph below.

Click image to enlarge

The index values for September are:

	August 2011	1 Month Change	12 Month Change
Mineral Price Index	73.9	1.1%	19.5%
Primary Producer Price Index	77.7	0.1%	24.5%
Secondary Producer Price Index	111.8	-0.1%	8.1%
Consumer Price Index	65.4	0.3%	7.6%

The following graph shows the development of the indices since October 2003.

Click image to enlarge

Full series of the four main price indices in Excel format
Full series of the four main price indices in CSV format



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Returning pilot? Visit Account Management for the latest offers and promotions.



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