Okay, a day late to test 'cause actually had to sleep during the night for once (shocking) but here we go. Going to use to format provided, will be referencing experience from test as of 7th of February 2021.
Destroyers
- Base energy recovery speed increased by 10%:
Pros:
This buff was aimed to allow for vanilla Destroyers (Rank 8, 11 and 14) to compete in battles more actively and allow for usage of higher energy dependant modules such as photon emitter.
The buff also applied to ‘Relic’ which has energy stability issues when using the special module “reflector shield”
Cons:
This buff will do nothing to bring Rank 8 and 11 Destroyers into relevance in traditional PvP
There is so much more flawed with the concept idea of Destroyers that this will have very minimal effect on any buff target bar Relic which actually kind of needed it.
Summary:
Although the buff is appreciated when using the ship “Relic” it will do very little - if not nothing to shift viability of lower rank Destroyers in mixed rank PvP or Conquest.
Destroyers
- Warp speed of destroyers through gates increased from 500 to standard 2000 m/sec.
Pros:
Before this change was finally given implementation it took:
- A default speed Destroyer (123m/s) took 1 minute 24 seconds to reach Beacon B from spawn on the map Iridium Strand
After the change was given implementation it has changed to:
- A default speed Destroyer (123m/s) took **55 seconds (+/- 2 seconds) **to reach Beacon B from spawn on the map Iridium Strand
This is a significant change and allows Destroyer players to play objectives more closely without having to rely heavily on extreme range AoE denial.
Cons:
Spoiler
The “rubberband” effect which players witnessed on the “Experimental Destroyer” NPC when it used the module “Jump Drive” occurs when leaving regular Warp Gates and can be somewhat jarring in regular gameplay. I suspect this “rubberband” is dependant on Destroyer components being seperate entities to the player ship but there is no possible way to confirm this in the brief testing periods.
Quantum Railgun
- The reload bonus of command modules from critical hit increased from 0.8 to 1.5%.
Pros:
This in theory will allow for higher command module up time when playing aggressively.
Cons:
The Quantum Railgun has flaws beyond the minimal bonus effect due to lack of tuning of the ships “Dart” and “Gargoyle”. Quantum Railgun suffers extremely from poor weapon cooling which players are unable to modify at all in a positive manour.
Summary:
In testing the buff had minimal impact on gameplay. The dependance on critical hits forces players into a very specific ship build which restricts other portions of the ship which require player correction such as energy regeneration and mobility.
The poor cooling of the weapon “Quantum Railgun” was still very prevalent and distracted from any benefit of playing the ship “Dart” so aggressively due to high downtimes due to weapon cooling.
Thi’Es beam
- Firing range increased by 10%
- Damage increased by 10%
- Minimum spread reduced to 0,15
Pros:
The minimum spread change means the weapon wind up is no longer as painful as it will target _ less _ enemies, in result draining less excess energy.
Cons:
This weapon still feels awful to use. The damage wind up is far too slow, the weapon targeting bonus enemies in the crosshairs akin to Thi’lith and Homing laser is annoying and restrictive on what ships can equip the weapon.
This weapon needs to have the damage increased more substantially or simply raise the damage floor but leave the damage ceiling as is.
Summary:
This weapon is still greatly underperforming and extremely restrictive on player builds when using the weapon.
Suggestion:
Remove this weapon from the default builds of the ships “Deimos 2” and “Lightbringer”.
I have seen many new players simply unable to control Thi’Es properly as the shift in mechanics is far too rapid for how early the weapon is available. Removing dynamic projectile weapons such as Guided Thermosphere, Flux Phaser, Thi’Es and Homing Laser should allow new players to climatise to regular gameplay before being forced to tackle unique gameplay mechanics associated with these weapons.
Phase Jump
- Cooldown increased from 20s to 25sec.
- Jump range increased from 1200 to 1800 m.
- Radar invisibility active time reduced to 5 sec.
Pros:
Players utilising this special module on the “Nightingale” ship will be less frequently radar immune and should encourage more thoughtful usage of the module rather than using the moment it is off cooldown
Cons:
This is one of the most misguided attempts at nerfing a module I have ever seen. This is an indirect buff due to the jump range increase and very limited changes to other statistics of the module.
This change will allow the ‘Nightingale’ ship to cover more ground than before with still very limited cooldown and the safety of radar invisilibity.
The change to cooldown of the module does not feel substantial at all and when briefly testing the ship it still felt more natural to utilise the special module the moment it was off of cooldown rather than keep it reserved for more dangerous situations or disengaging from unfavourable engagements.
Suggestion:
- Cooldown increased from 20s to 30sec.
- Jump range increased from 1200 to 1500 m.
- Radar invisilibty active time reduced to 5 sec.
Current changes simply do not alter the performance of the ship substantially enough to justify such a small adjustment.
These were the main ones I looked over whilst I was briefly on the test server.
My only further questions are:
Why were the Detonation and “Ellydium Bot” changes removed?
The detonation mode change would have made the mode less punishing on players who are not able to utilise extremely fast ship setups due to latency or players who simply do not want to participate in the mode as teams would be able to engage prior to the objective appearing.
Ellydium bots are able to throw the balance of a “PvP” match in setup by a landslide if more than one Thar’ga is spawned at a time. It is not uncommon for matches with “Join in Progress” still available to be either cut short or become completely one sided due to the presence of these bots with such extreme damage modifiers.
