[Karash]

Did anyone else think the battles were way to short in Jumpgate Classic? It would be nice to keep the weapon power relatively equal to what it is now, but up the armor/shields of the various ships (if they are not getting totally remade) 2 or 3 times to promote longer lasting PVP.

Thoughts?

[Chemdog]

The fighters would be nice to have this, yes. I don't know when the last time you tried to down a freighter was but I can assure you when a fighter blazes guns on a freighter, the freighter pilot can sip his coffee in peace for at least 2 sectors.

[Ambrosius]

Karash, while I tend to agree, other changes would have to be made. One of the big complaints about today's PvP is the fight and flee tactic. While I don't practise it, it doesn't really bother me -- but to many PvPers it ruins the experience.

Adding more survivability to fighters would only exacerbate this issue unless is was balanced by making it harder to "flee" -- but making sectors much larger, POSes much rarer, etc.

[Karash]

yea I am mainly referring to active combat between opposing forces...not interdiction actions.

[TexMurphy]

I would have to say no. But I base that on flying a ship that is very defensive and flying it defensivly.

When flying a ship that has engagement and disengagement initiative then fights are definatly not too short. When flying a ship that cant flee I can see that problem.

But overall I dont think there needs to be any drastical increases in armour and shields.

Survivability is obviously much more then shields and armour. Accelleration, Speed, Flashfires and profile all come into the formula of survivability.

Tex

[alphabet]

To answer the question:
I actually didnt think that fights were too short in Jumpgate, they are actually pretty long. Have you played any wwii flight MMOs? The time between engagement and someones death is a matter of seconds as there are no shields and very little armor on aircraft. If you have the jump on your opponent, he is pretty much dead meat unless you do something really stupid.

@Tex
I agree with you on how much of a hot potato ship balance threads can be. The faster ships can and will disengage at will, however the slower ships should be harder to kill and have more firepower. That, IMHO, should be the basis of factional ships strengths and weaknesses. Regardless, that is how it was with the ships in EP1. I really didnt see a flaw with that basic design, however there is always room for refinement.

[TexMurphy]

I agree alph there is nothing wrong with the concept of having differnet ship characteristics where there are faster and slower ships.

What I generaly feel was wrong was that Oct had a factional trend of armour, big guns and slow ships.

Big guns and slow ships go well hand in hand. Armour and slow ships doesnt go that well hand in hand. To repair armour you need to disengage which you cant do if you are slower and have worse accelleration.

A ship that can disengage can always go and repair.

So the way I see it is that ships that are in a initiative disadvantage (speed and/or accelleration) should have proportionaly more shields then armour while a ship with initiative advantage should have proportionaly more armour to shield.

Please view this just conceptually and not specificly to any Jumpgate Classic ships.

Tex