Discovery 5.1 Dev Diary #3 - More System Changes & Other Things

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Dumb question - why balance cruisers around duels at all? Same for BCs - who even duels these in real game anymore?

The primary goal of most of 5.1 is actually to address interclass balance problems, like say the fact that a Bretonia Destroyer can probably kill every larger cap in the game without taking hull damage. Defense turrets are just a way to have a "defender's advantage" in the class, like mines do for snubs and gunboats and BC heavies do for BCs. I think it's just generally good for a class to have an answer for another ship parking right on top of it and trying to facetank it. Even more so if that class has weak spots in the back in the form of engines. It naturally encourages a little bit more playing at range, poking away and such in 1v1 and smaller scale fights, which I think is preferable over "point at enemy ship, thrust, hold right click with your most efficient guns until it dies".

The point of added complexity in the form of (things like) shield management is, as people have kind of noted in this thread, to add more mechanics for players to learn to master. Raise the skill ceiling. Since the shield drain goes away naturally when your shields are at 100%, it's not mandatory to even do, but it does obviously offer a big power boost if you learn to do it correctly. I think it's the right kind of depth to add to a class because it isn't absolutely mandatory to use, but is rewarding if you do decide to devote some time to learning it.

I do also think that making duels between all classes in the game fun is just healthy for the game. What's wrong with it being potentially enjoyable to match that one hostile capital ship in your ZoI with a capital ship of the same class, and just having a good old "contest of skill" to see who comes out on top? Sounds fun to me. We've been balancing snubs for both duels and groupfights for over a decade, mostly successfully, with a few exceptions (looking at you, light missiles). Why not try to do the same with every class in the game? I am also of the opinion that the lack of capital ship duels could very well be caused by previously underwhelming duel balance, and I could see them be more popular if we did manage to make duels a fun, dynamic, skill-based experience. A bit of a chicken vs egg situation.

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