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Topic: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Seriously , even fitting an ECCM I get almost perma target disrupted. on the alpha-2 island of Shinjalar its horrible.

There are groups of ECM Bots everywhere, everything will neut you jam you demob you. Its pretty much just a miracle I havent lost a mech yet. Farming any of these spawns is almost impossible.

I realize this is an MMO but making every NPC spawn require multiple people to farm it is absurd , especially on an alpha island. Everything is fine they just Jam wayy to much with no means to a counter.

I could kill the 1-2 mech spawns if i could actually shoot 50% of the time, but im lucky to get 10-15% with an ECCM. This needs adjusted.

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

NPC ECMs are too powerful but it's due to their numbers and unlimited AP that it's a pain.
It takes a long time to train up to be as stable as some of their ECM setups are.
There is usually more than one ECMing NPC in any spawn that ECMs.

In the dev blog they've state they're going to rebalance NPC spawns so hopefully they're going to remove all but one or two ewar from every spawn and reserve ewar for "Captains" or other such NPCs.

  • TOG
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

yeah jam spam is *** annoying

  • CIR
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

oh god here we go again, more crying about not being able to solo.

  • CIR
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

ya, Heaven forbid anyone actually wants to attempt something while not in a full group.
yes, we all know this is an MMO, but I'd call it more than just a bit closed minded to say that EVERYTHING within any mmo requires multiple players.

And I'm not saying everything should be soloable, but "crying about not being able to solo" tells me that you think being able to solo anything (aside from transport assignments) is unnecessary.  Am I wrong? Because having the devs say they'll look into NPC spawn balance tells me that maybe, just maybe, some tweaking may be necessary.  Or do you know better than the devs?

6 Reply by Snowman (edited by Snowman 2011-07-22 09:58:03)

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Yes, sorry I was very blunt.

But I dont mean that there should be NO solo content, of course solo content is indeed necessary,  but when someone is attempting to solo content design for more than one player (I didnt say full group) then it annoys me.

Because when content design for 'more than one player' is "balanced" to be more soloable because of complaints like these.. then it never ends until everything is soloable.

Edit;

Additionally,  when you nerf things to be soloable for noob characters, whats the benefit of having an older more experienced character that can use bots that are then able to solo the earlier content?

If this was a traditional MMO, you wouldnt say.. "FFS, Im level 10, why cant I solo level 30 stuff?"

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Also, in this game you can't walk into a 'tavern' and say "Verily, yonder marauding Filtch gang is draining my batteries and useing dark eletronics to counter my holy hand grenades.  Whilst thou aid me in my robo-quest".

Grouping up can be much harder when people are almost constantly active when online.  No robo-wenches sitting around the power socket gossiping here.

Sociorum, inimicos, omnes

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

ECCM module nees a boost

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Snowman wrote:

Yes, sorry I was very blunt.

But I dont mean that there should be NO solo content, of course solo content is indeed necessary,  but when someone is attempting to solo content design for more than one player (I didnt say full group) then it annoys me.

Because when content design for 'more than one player' is "balanced" to be more soloable because of complaints like these.. then it never ends until everything is soloable.

Edit;

Additionally,  when you nerf things to be soloable for noob characters, whats the benefit of having an older more experienced character that can use bots that are then able to solo the earlier content?

If this was a traditional MMO, you wouldnt say.. "FFS, Im level 10, why cant I solo level 30 stuff?"


The op was talking about alpha island, more suited for new players.

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10 Reply by Arga (edited by Arga 2011-07-22 19:59:02)

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Actually OP was talking about Alpha-II, which is most definetly not for beginning players.

Alpha-II is supposed to be both a stepping stone to Beta-1 and harder content for snuggly but advanced carebears.

Ewar may indeed need some balancing though, so I'm not disagreeing with that.

However, if your like me, I didn't bother putting any EP into anti-ewar, because I don't PVP.

Just putting an ECCM module, put not training into it, isn't a NPC issue.

There's this perception that it's OK to just go full DPS for PVE fit then expect to be able to Tank and counter NPC's.

I'm not saying this is the OP's issue, but I would bet that most Mechs have T4 weapons/sensor amp/tuners and a T1 ECCM, if they even bother to fit one.

I know I don't, and if you in a group that's fine, because it's likely that only 1 of you is going to get ecm'd, so the other can finish it off.

It would be interesting to know just how many PVE solo farmers fit full DPS vs a balanced DPS/anti-ewar/tank fit.

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

I see no problem with it. If you cant handle it, go somewhere else.  Use 2 sensor amps so even if you do get jammed you can re-lock fast.

I see no problem with how it currently is.  The superior Kain observer on Tellesis is an ECM nightmare, but I take that as a challenge than anything.

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  • JOKE
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

I'll tell you, I set up my baphomet mk2 for farming with:

1 t2 sensor amp (fitting skills aren't completly maxed yet)
2 t3 laser tunings
1 t4 armor rep tuning

5 t4 light lasers

1 t4 lwf, 1 t4 small rep, 1 niani co reactor, 1 t3 medium auxillary accumulator.

I've farmed plenty of the spawns on tellesis, and never had any real problems yet. The rep takes a little bit of micro management, but I can forget to turn it off for 30 seconds, still run my guns and not be out of cap. Haven't run into a spawn out there yet of lights that I couldnt "solo" with that fit (I do use my alt with a heavy sheild tank in a lithus to sometimes draw aggro and tank 2-3 of them while im killing some others).

I haven't done too much solo mech farming, but I do some last night on tellesis in my seth against arbiter tyrannos (5 of them) and it was pretty easy to stay out of their locking range.
Try looking for spawns that have a really long path, 1000m or so, so you can stay out of their locking range by running backwards as you fire. All 5 of the tyrannos had ecms and drainers.

I also agree that the ecms are a bit too powerful on npcs, though. If you think that the progression for someone that enjoys soloing is from alpha 1 to alpha 2 then maybe to beta if they dont mind pvp, then the spawns need to be reviewed in that sense. How many EP should you have - spent fully on combat - before those spawns should be solo'able.

OP - Others are also right in their assement that there ARE ways to counter those spawns, and if they're not for a mission, I'd say you need to look at other spawns in the area to farm. Change up your fitting so you can stay out of their range. Use range extenders if you're having trouble dps'ing at the range you need to be at to stay out of their lock range. Get an alt in a really well tanked bot to pull for you (it kind of isn't solo'ing when you do it this way) and be the target for ECM's (NPC's dont seem to change ew targets, only dps).

  • CIR
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Smoke, My Baph MK II is setup similar but I'm to cheap to go for T3 tunings, so I just use (3) T1's and no rep tuner.

But I have reactor ext 10 so replace the acc and co reator with uni armor.

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I always have the combat window open, and I can see them trying to ecm me, it seems once it works once, it always works. That is I'll see 4 or 5 failures from multiple bots, then 100% success after the first one breaks my lock. Course, this could have to do with getting suppressed too.

The 3 star Assault/Light spawn out of Tellesis is a great example. There's 4 lights and 2 assaults. I start by kiting them, until I break up the bunch. It takes alot longer to kill the assaults, so if you get caught focusing on them, 2 lights will both start ECM'ing you. Once two of them start, even with fast relock, I'm better off just backing out and letting them reset then trying to 'beat' the ecm timer on 2.

But, in general the idea is you can 'burn-down' some mobs, but you can't always just rush in and try to beat the spawn retimer with pure dps.

It's the same old thing though when we talk about mechs, just because you can sit in a mech, doesn't make you effective in it. Advanced Robotics is an expensive extensions, as well as the medium weapon extensions.

And, you still need Critical Hit, reduction in cycle times, accelerated locking, ect ect ect.

14 Reply by Smokeyii (edited by Smokeyii 2011-07-23 01:44:50)

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

The medium t3 auxillary accumulator uses alot of reactor, i have reactor expansion 10 as well, but with everthing else t4 i need the co-reactor.

15 Reply by Winter Solstice (edited by Winter Solstice 2011-07-23 23:47:37)

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

For lack of anythign perp related I need say "Nerf ECM... because of Falcon."

ECM bnots blow up fast enough, the issue is likely that ppl can't blow them up fast enough (in a balanced way).  I remember rumors of changing groups f mobs to have maybe one EWAR bot, or 2, as oppose to 3-4.  That's the issue, not that they use it, but they're basically "blobbing EWAR".  So instead replace them with DPS bots, or something, to keep it as hard as it should be, but not terrifying to encounter these groups.

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock, one volley, jam.
Lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock, one volley, jam.
Lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock, one volley, jam.
Lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock - nope, lock, one volley, jam.

All the while they have an armor rep running so you never actually do any damage.

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Mouse Tiger wrote:

ECCM module nees a boost

Not realy, they just need to be fixed to work against NPC ECM wink.

Either it's a bug that they don't work ... or some NPC are bugged and use to strong ECM (infinity strong ECM maybe).

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Snowman wrote:

oh god here we go again, more crying about not being able to solo.

Snow, you play your way, and we will play our way. Games such as this that force grouping tend to have a rather limited appeal... In other words, they are much less profitable than they might other wise be. There is room in the game for lone wolves as well as corporations.

If you can't kill it, don't make it mad.
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Snowman wrote:

oh god here we go again, more crying about not being able to solo.

You got it.
It's not like we need to solo. The game is booming. Thousands in General at low times. Hell, you can PUG any time, day or night. No need for a corp, though they are easy to get in to. No fear of spies and other paranoid crap.

Keep the Ewar as is. We should be ground to a stand still while grinding PvE. This is after all a PvE game.

Yay for OP'ed NPCs!

  • JOKE
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

range

One man army
http://www.perp-kill.net/related/239910
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

bring on the F.O.F missiles !!!!

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

Love how people watch the first "bad" comment, stop reading the thread and try to write a witty remark...! Without seeing that the person they quote already said he is sorry and too blunt tongue Is this the new way people roll on the forums? big_smile

<GargajCNS> we maim to please
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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

It's annoying and expensive to fight them, so I avoid them instead. Their range is too long to damp them, the respawn is too quick to nail them and hit the juicy mobs, and the time spent playing footsie could be better used fighting bots that don't jam so damn much.

Honestly it'd be nice if ewar resist increased each time it succeeded against you up to some max cap. That way you wouldn't get stuck in an endless loop of boring sitting about. Happens in pvp too, just as irritating there.

Honestly? I'd prefer we ditched the ECM mechanic entirely for ewar mods that lowered optimal and increased hit dispersion/guidance failure chance. Look at how damps work. If you succeed in getting a hit, lock time goes up and lock range goes down. You can counter it by getting closer and changing targets rarely. That's an on the field tactical counter. ECM is a bad mechanic because it doesn't have an on the field tactic that can minimize its effectiveness. It's very build wars; either you fit around it or you suffer from it. Blah.

ECM on its own is fairly balanced. Annoying, but not game breaking. The problem comes when it gets coupled with damps. A 20+ sec lock time with a couple ECM mods trained on you and your bot might as well not be on the field. Lame.

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

ECM, either NPC or Player, should confer a degree of resistance per event; in other MMO's it's called 'Stun Resistance' - i.e. you can't usually be stuck in an endless stunned loop no matter how hard the foe tries (barring exploits).

So if you've been ECM'd you're immune to continued uses of ECM for a set duration (for brevity let's say the default duration of a target lock cycle - about 10 seconds).   With damps or demobs each subsequent attack only has a portion of its full effect so that, after three stacked effects no more effect can be achieved.

And ECCM needs to have a more active result... rather than simply protecting the user, it should actually counter the attack.   With an extension plus a module, let's say ECCM, a successful counterattack can have a possibility of reflecting the attack back on the issuing bot (a small chance, mind you) after each successful counter.

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Re: Enough of the NPC ECM already!

"Diminishing returns", but it's mostly a PVP function for balance, NPC's are rarely subject to it. NPC's have a fixed setup, introducing DR on something is done to allow something to be useful to use, but not spamable, NPC's just don't have the AI or range of fits so have to just spam what they have.

In PVP, this isn't that much of an issue because the NPC's don't have to worry about accumulator while the player does.

What it feels like is players want to fit DPS items only in the head, and are OK with tank Items in the legs because it doesn't reduce DPS to have it. In another thread, a poster mention they use ECM and supression on NPC's and it generally provided more DPS than putting tuners in.

I know that's why I don't use them, but i'm also not solo farming mesmers groups with a Mech that takes 1 min each bot.