I have for quite some time now been hearing that while the Amarr and Minmitar racial bonuses are useful the Gallente and Caldari bonuses are a bit lack luster.

As such input and feedback is being sought regarding the state of Gal and Cal racial bonuses, and how to polish the experience and utility of same.

When responding to this thread please note your primary role / primary context for use of each item being commented on so that proper context can be applied.

Cheers,
Cross

PS ~ Allow me to preemptively state that both direct range and direct damage buffs are likely off the table due to game wide weapons balance considerations and that the current intent of maintaining some degree of racial flavor within the bonus selected is indented to be maintained. That being said let's put our heads together and figure out a way to improve these racial buffs.

Likely off the table, yes.

That does not prevent me from expressing my opinion.

Current roughed out idea(s) from conversations so far (I'm still catching up on the thread since I posted it right before I left for work yesterday).

I am interesting in perceptions on this (and of course feel free to continue to put forth other ideas).

Cheers,
Cross

Lol and thats why you shouldn't skype with strange people on the net lolz. Did he/she convince you lol? ..Sigh..

Back to the topic:
The goal should be to make each classes more unique instead of attempting to generalize them or attempt to make them over powered; It might even help if you Imagine the RR and CR in a balance state.

More specifically to the point, Is it the buff type or the numeric value which causes issues?

So if we buff the plasma rifle optimal 5-8m, what should the gal assault have with its new found optimal range?

This is in reference to the mentioned Gal bonus yes? Rather than the mentioned Cal bonus?

Presuming that is the case an elaboration also needs to be made for more weapons that the Gal AR (not saying this needs to happen in your quoted text, just in general) because the assault bonus being defined by a single weapon seems like a poor method to take. In the case of the Gal this makes finding applicable buffs tricky.

I realize that "feel" is more than a little slippery when it comes to how it interacts with numeric balance and certainly giving something extra power because the feel isn't as appealing will rarely result in a positive outcome so keeping an eye on that is key.

'Threading the needle' this point consists of finding something which address the consistent requests for a more meaningful Gal/Cal bonus, applies to more than one weapon sub-type within the racial line, and does not break the power curve. Some of this stuff is apples to oranges but it is all relevant.

Charming as always I see, MINA.

How despicable of me to talk to a CPM member who asked for feedback. A disgusting effort to horribly unbalance all the things ever in my favour, by all accounts. Truly, it is outrageous that someone would dare put forward their opinion.
Had I not gone for complete transparency and posted the entire conversation, you wouldn't even have known that I was relevant here. Clearly a shadowy and nefarious attempt to make something overpowered!

Sarcasm aside, do you have a personal problem here? When did Kirk or I post something incendiary? Do you simply disagree with our opinions?
If it's simply that you disagree, I suggest trying to find a more civil way of disagreeing in future. A simple 'I disagree' would have sufficed. If you feel the need to insult people merely because they don't share your opinion, perhaps you're not ready for civil discussion?

If you have a problem with what I said to Cross, explain what it is, rather than bitching about me expressing my opinion.

The Gallente assault bonus is ineffective.

Nobody has ever needed less recoil on an assault rifle. Or any of the other Gallente weapons, for that matter.

It is only in a few cases that lower dispersion is useful.

Lower dispersion is not useful for the assault, breach, or burst plasma rifles. The dispersion on them is entirely tight enough for any form of CQC already, especially on the breach - you cannot possibly need tighter hipfire on the breach.

The only rifle it has some use on is the TAR, and even less so now than it did previously after the hipfire was tightened so significantly. The TAR hipfire is now quite happily up to the task of sometimes engaging targets CQC.

The shotgun does not benefit because everything relies on the centre of the reticle, and recoil has certainly never been a problem for it.

The ion pistol no longer needs the bonus to be mildly functional and is now an adequate weapon in its own right.

Thus, the bonus does not give a significant benefit to any Gallente weapon. In comparison to this, we have the Amarr assault bonus, which has earth-shatteringly powerful effects for the SCR and LR, and the Minmatar assault bonus, which covers the main weakness of the CR and turns it into even more of an engine of destruction.

How, exactly, can the hipfire bonus possibly be construed as 'UNBELIEVABLY POWERFUL'?

The bonus is not spurned because it is not very visible, it is spurned because it is ineffective.

How do you define 'performance'? The Amarr bonus certainly translates very well into actual killing power - the Amarr assault allows you to reliably use the SCR charged shot in vollies without overheating, which gives an absolutely massive performance hike over the unbonused form. That gives a significant advantage in killing power.

As for commandos being the best with their weapons... Really? You say that it only holds true if assaults cannot damage mod past the bonus and that most can't, but... Most can. Both the Amarr and Gallente commandos will be outperformed in terms of raw damage by the equivalent assaults because both assaults can damage mod much more heavily than the commandos. Additionally, the Amarr assault is specifically favoured over the commando for its beneficial effects. If you ask the the LR aficionados whether they would rather use the assault or the commando, they will answer the commando. I guarantee you that the winner of the LR officer weapon used an Amarr assault simply because the Amarr assault is much more damaging with the LR.

The only case in which this can be held to be correct is perhaps the Caldari commando and the sniper rifle - this unique instance due to the importance of alpha in the sniper role.

As for a blanketed buff another equipment slot would allow us to use our pointlessly high CPU/PG.