Destroyers are "destroying" pvp game-play.

Game Discussion PvP
1

Let’s start whit this: no they are not “op”.

 

It’s just that they don’t fit in star conflict pvp game-play.

After few weeks of testing them in t3, tournaments and dread fights we can easily say that they totally changed the way this game was played. 

 

I will not bring “numbers” and stats, if you consider only them you will end up pointing out that a single cov ops in the right hands can kill an isolated destro (well, it still depends on many factors). That’s not the point.

The point is that we have now a new class of ship that works too good as suppressing tool.

It’s like introducing in an “airplanes dogfight game”: smart (well guarded) aa all over the place. I’m not saying Star conflict is a “dogfight game”, that was just an example. 

 

With the right supports you can pin an entire team by using a couple of those ships, cutting out from the game short range fighters and most of interceptors that are forced to stay undercover waiting for the right time to strike (moment that depending on your teammates and circumstances: could never arrive). Also frigs are completely defenseless against them (especially guards. engies somehow with barriers and warp gate still can handle the dps from destros; lrfs can cloak and rt away), a slow guard is just a tasty targets, he can’t gtfo in time or reach the beacons or the area of fight in time without being focused by uber dps damage. Making them an easy target for the enemy.

 

About the “objectives related” ships and such: it’s too easy to defend a beacon by spraying mesons, using autofire turrets and that “death-ray”.

In order to acquire a beacon you need to get rid of aod ships, and that’s totally fine. What is not fine at all is that to do so: you need to bring down destroyers defending them, something that you can’t do in time (beacon hunt is where it happens the most). At least you can’t do it without using another destroyer that focus the enemy’s one. But even then, time is running out, also other ships guarding will make impossible to change the beacon owner. Most of the time capping a beacons means holding it forever. Especially in maps that lacks of covers.

 

We already had aod ships, those were the guards (at least a well fitted one). It occurred years and “painful” decisions to balance somehow them in the whole scheme. In this game we have tons of different roles (which can be played in so many different ways) and that leaded to multiples factors to consider in order to acquire a decent balance. Now we have those ships that nullify most of the game-play we had so far, introducing something more “flat”, moba oriented and considering what “was” star conflict": completely alienated from the essence of the game.

They deeply influence tactics, fits and play stiles. In maps where there are no “useful covers” destroyers shine the most, making short range ships and slow ones pointless to use somehow.

So it’s not a mere “stats and numbers” matter. It’s something related to how those ships completely changed the whole scheme AND the game.

 

T3 now completely rotate toward destroyers, leaving other classes subordinated to them. At least it’s a good thing that with missions and free stuffs to newbies you gave one of those to everyone (more or less), otherwise what’s the point to play “regularly” ships tree if all the game is completely changed? Don’t we had already enough game-play contents that was somehow balanced or that needed few tweaks?  

We have dreadnought that needs desperately improvements (still waiting t5 sectors also), we needed somehow leagues to have something “challenging” to do between vets (but for god sake not in exchange of 3+ squads in pvp). Do we really needed this massive change, which is far from being balanced? It will be almost impossible to let them “fit” without completely upset the pvp as it happens now.

 

I fear the day destroyers will populate t5 pvp, I really do. That is the last spot where to play without this such huge change to game mechanics. I can’t imagine how bad could it be if 4 men squads were still allowed, with 3 destros + engi or command on one side… is this one of the reason we lost big squads? 'Cause i had this “conspiracy tough”.

 

Sorry but I want to play Star conflict not “destrosflict”. That’s why I am proposing to remove them from regular pvp. Confining them to all the others game modes that**  somehow  **can handle them way better than pvp between randoms can do.

Weekends tournament where squads can face each others with a minimum of strategy (searching good ones is also a way to have fun, somehow), pve, dreadfights (well I can talk also about how destros influence them in a really bad way, letting empire dreads “camping strategy” being even more effective than before), leagues (not 5vs5 btw): can handle destroyers meta way better than “random” pvp. 

 

P.s. Since this is one of my few posts not “rage related”, and since I really care about this matter: I wish we could keep this discussion “troll free”.

2

Agreed, but to an extent. As destros are indeed ruining random PvP, a decent Interceptor, other destro, or an organised team can easily take out destroyers.

I suggest simply balancing them via match and having even amounts of destros on each battle. Either that, or restrict them to games that have squads in them. I like option 1 better.

3

i think the combination of extremely high firepower, tank and the movement spell together, especially in combination with their defense shields, which are all awesome things by themselves, make them a bit too versatile.

 

Albeit in pvp i did not notice them as much as a balance breaker, as long both teams fielded them.

In fact I like the fact, that some maps now get used in more ways than the standard path through the map.

 

I do not own a destro, I only know them as enemy, and so far, from that perspective, they are only scary if one team lacks them completely. Otherwise, the metagame just forces you to use larger areas of the map, which sometimes collides with narrower game modes. Most destros end up shooting other destros.

 

The problem of spawn camping is of course there, but lets be honest, that wasnt really changed much by the destros, in fact, sometimes rather balanced matches can occur simply, because the destro can defend at least the spawnpoint even if you have no idea how to move a ship; which is proven to be no hindrance to reach t5 btw.

4

And maybe its also a problem simply by how points are measured, how respawn times are stacked etc. in the game itself, which makes ships suiciding so costly, while does not really reward if you finally remove a destro from the field.

 

I don’t think they can’t work in SC at all, and until now I found them funny, but I do not fly them, nor do I find it cool, that basicly you are forced to bring destros in any team setup. On the other hand, the same is true for an engi…

 

Finally, it will be pretty interesting how this will impact T4&T5 with CtB mode, once people have multiple destros, or whole teams of destros.

5

Like I said. Just put destros on both teams and your problem is solved.

Also I think that there should be a reward scale for ship kills, to go along with your second post. Lemme make a suggestion for that.

6

 

Albeit in pvp i did not notice them as much as a balance breaker, as long both teams fielded them.

In fact I like the fact, that some maps now get used in more ways than the standard path through the map.

 

 

And that works for team battle. What about the others game modes where having control of the battlefield is crucial? You need beacons that are always at the same spot, so it will be always one only “point of arrive” even if you use different paths than before to get “there”. 

 

Like I said. Just put destros on both teams and your problem is solved.

Also I think that there should be a reward scale for ship kills, to go along with your second post. Lemme make a suggestion for that.

 

It’s not a matter of balance. It’s related to how destroyers changed completely “roles and rules”.

7

They made CovOps even more dangerous. That’s about all I see.

8

Perhaps there should be a limit to how many destroyers can be on the battlefield at a time? Like 2 per team maybe?

 

As per current, random teams have hard time bringing down destroyers in any timely manner. Then again, a single cov ops colliding it with plasma arc on is pretty much going to fry half of the subsystems. I would reduce destroyer overall survivability, but increase subsystem durability. That would make hull tanking of imperial destroyers less silly too.

 

And I think Anomaly Generator should do extra damage to destroyers.

9

When it is ~20% destroyers from whole team number, then it is refreshingly different to me, but if you get 30-40%+of the team as destroyers it is quickly sux dynamics out of the game and it becomes extremely boring

10

Given they are another class, perhaps explosion damage is even bigger on them, and maybe things like disintegrator could do something interesting like piercing through and making a cool fragmentation effect :slight_smile:

11

I’d say follow the damage scale and make explosives deal more damage to them. Like inties take little exp damage, destroyers should take at least 1.2x damage.

12

Just tested by firing a Tempest missile salvo into a wall next to my Archon. It takes explosion damage with multiplier of approximately 1.74.

 

Tempest did 2465 damage per hit (base value 3415), and my Archon has thermal shield resistance of 100 + 41. Without a modifier the damage should have been 3415 * 100 / (100 + 100 + 41) = 1417 per hit.

 

Frigates then seem to use something like 1.31, atleast in case of Inquisitor AE and Octopus missiles.

13

Frigates took 125% from memory and inties 66%. So it seems destroyers take 175% from your test which is probably ok.

I’d like to see an updated disintegrator effect though :slight_smile: Not sure if we should also give them better effectiveness against destroyers along with some other certain weapons.

14

And that works for team battle. What about the others game modes where having control of the battlefield is crucial? You need beacons that are always at the same spot, so it will be always one only “point of arrive” even if you use different paths than before to get “there”. 

 

thats what i meant with narrower game modes, where things have to be concentrated on points of interest; while some maps work nice with some of those modes, others become terrible. And that just about the game modes and maps covering T3 so far, things will get even more “interesting”

15

But it is almost exactly 1.74, not 1.75, which is a bit odd.

 

That 1.31 I got for the frigate confuses me even more, as I expected their modifier to be 1.25 based on what I’ve heard previously. So, I tested again, now with Crus A and Octopus. 1270 damage done per hit (base value 1829), against kinetic shield resistance of 90. Damage without modifier should be 1829 * 100 / (100 + 90) = 962.6. Frigate modifier is thus approximately 1270 / 962.6 = 1.319.

 

And yes, Anomaly Generator should still do some more damage to destroyers.

16

But it is almost exactly 1.74, not 1.75, which is a bit odd.

 

That 1.31 I got for the frigate confuses me even more, as I expected their modifier to be 1.25 based on what I’ve heard previously. So, I tested again, now with Crus A and Octopus. 1270 damage done per hit (base value 1829), against kinetic shield resistance of 90. Damage without modifier should be 1829 * 100 / (100 + 90) = 962.6. Frigate modifier is thus approximately 1270 / 962.6 = 1.319.

 

And yes, Anomaly Generator should still do some more damage to destroyers.

In regards to the last part,the anomaly generator does roughly 36k damage against an archon with 52 em resists (34% damage resitance), I’d say that it is more than enough for single shot damage.

 

In regards to the OP however, I’d say that removing destroyers from pvp is too much of an extreme option. Perhaps limit them from certain game modes (ie; detonation, domination) or if we want to go to a higher extreme… nerf them. Destroyers right now have 2 down sides: Low energy regen speed, and low acceleration. I think that destroyers may need the shield resist malus that guards have hanging over them.

17

When it is ~20% destroyers from whole team number, then it is refreshingly different to me, but if you get 30-40%+of the team as destroyers it is quickly sux dynamics out of the game and it becomes extremely boring

 

We agree on something sometimes.

 

To the other guys: my thread was not about "balancing’ stuffs, the whole forum is full of such discussion. I’ m pointing out how destros completly change mechanics and gameplay. And they do it in a way that makes all different from before.

18

In regards to the last part,the anomaly generator does roughly 36k damage against an archon with 52 em resists (34% damage resitance), I’d say that it is more than enough for single shot damage.

 

In regards to the OP however, I’d say that removing destroyers from pvp is too much of an extreme option. Perhaps limit them from certain game modes (ie; detonation, domination) or if we want to go to a higher extreme… nerf them. Destroyers right now have 2 down sides: Low energy regen speed, and low acceleration. I think that destroyers may need the shield resist malus that guards have hanging over them.

 

I know my solution is “extreme”, but I seriously doubt devs can find a way to balance everything without distort destroyer’s meta or the " old" gameplay as it happens now.

 

If we had a larger playerbase I wuold have suggested a separate que for them, but you know. We don’t have numbers for that.

 

So my radical solution sounded to me more reasonable in the end :stuck_out_tongue:

19

I agree with Spongejohn, destroyers are ruining the game. Where T3 was first my favourite tier I just totaly stopped playing it. Games are boring, one sided and require not skill at all. If this how T4 and T5 will turn out I ll probably quit all together. This is not the game I enjoyed for so lang, This game is moving in the wrong direction. Destroyers should be put in a seperate game mode or be removed all together.

20

Eh, destroyers will be completely fine if just limited to 1 or 2 per team. It is this current about 6 destroyers per team trying to get Broker’s missions done thing that is messed up.