Severus Smith
Caldari State
519
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Posted - 2014.05.08 16:10:00 -
[1] - Quote
Legion needs to stand out against other FPS shooters on the PC. It cannot hope to compete in regards to raw gameplay with more polished shooters with many more years of development and much larger budgets. As such, Legion needs to excel in other areas that provide player enjoyment and encourage the New Eden Sandbox. One huge area that Legion can excel is in dropsuit versatility.
Legion GÇô Dropsuits.pdf (Please read first)
Fitting ships in EVE is fun, challenging, and rewarding; so using the same Tech 1 and Tech 2 system as the baseline for dropsuits gives players a lot of fitting versatility. As shown in the PDF above, roles could be established using % bonuses based on skills in the same manner that EVE ships have. This allows new players to get into a role quickly (a CCP goal) yet also ensures that it takes several months to fully maximize a specific role (another CCP goal). A great example is the Rifter and the Wolf from EVE Online where this system already works wonderfullyGǪ
Rifter
Due to its low skill requirements a new player can fit and fly a Rifter in less than an hour. Next, they could reach a decent level of proficiency with the Rifter within a week. However, to maximize the Rifter and all its fittings would take them several months to get level V in core skills, Tech 2 turrets, Tech 2 modules, etc. This is a great system of quick entry -> long mastery.
Wolf
The Wolf is a specialized Tech 2 Rifter that excels at PvP combat. However, it costs well over 20x the price of a Rifter and takes 24 days of skill training just to fly. The price and skill time also do not include the other fittings you would need to put on this ship. This is a very specialized ship.
Result
A pilot in a Wolf will pretty much always beat a pilot in a Rifter in 1 vs 1 PvP. And that is because the Wolf is a specialized Assault Frigate. However, the Rifter (which is 20x cheaper) will outperform the Wolf in scanning, scouting and tackling while still remaining a decent PvP platform. This means that the Wolf is mainly used in PvP situations where a large amount of ISK is up for grabs. The Wolf is very powerful, but it is not godlike. A poorly skilled Wolf pilot could lose to a maxed Rifter pilot. And two average Rifter pilots have a decent chance to take down a lone Wolf.
For Legion, this would allow players to quickly enter a new role / suit and, if enjoyed, become decent in it within a week or two. However, to truly master the Tech 1 suit requires months of skill training. And then that opens up the Tech 2 suit, which could take a year or more to finally perfect. This gives veteran players something to keep improving without making them OP proto gods (in comparison to new players) like they are now. A Tech 2 suit would be powerful, but could still die fairly easily on the battlefield.
Overall, this would give Legion a lot of fitting fun and flexibility lacking in other FPS titles.
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