Helping New players that don't understand that they need to rep
Helping Shield tankers use their low slots for regulators instead of always allocating one to a reactive/rep for that minimum 1hp/s
Helping versatility, ferroscale usually gets dumped for a reactive, kincats, etc. Having a mandatory slot requirement to be reps is not fun

How about implementing something like self repair with the rep tool, at a reduced efficiency?

Forcing you to be stationary to repair your armor (only possible out of combat).

This would give shield tankers the possibility to rep their armor up without giving them passive reps.

We already have this, it's called a compact nanohive :P
Or any of the armor rep hives (although those use up quite a bit of cpu...kinda bad for a shield suit)

Helping New players that don't understand that they need to rep
Helping Shield tankers use their low slots for regulators instead of always allocating one to a reactive/rep for that minimum 1hp/s
Helping versatility, ferroscale usually gets dumped for a reactive, kincats, etc. Having a mandatory slot requirement to be reps is not fun

Thanks for going into more detail.

1. Can you explain how native repping conveys the need to fit a repper? A shield suit needs no repper and armor starter suits have them prefitted, right?
If you're worrying about new players that select a shield-heavy race and never learn about reppers I'd guess the 'selected race <-> starter fit race' link should be broken up so everyone can see what a shield and armor based suit looks like. On the other hand, by the time a player moves on from his own race's suits he will probably have gotten a picture of the available modules in the game.

2. Personally, if I had innate reps I'd drop a regulator to fit more armor on my Caldari suits. Isn't that the logical thing to do? This is an honest question, I'm not trying to be provocative here.
If the issue is that shield-heavy suits can't utilize a certain part of their tank in their second or third engagement we can maybe discuss shoveling some more suit-armor hp into suit-shields.

3. There is no mandatory slot requirement as far as I'm aware? My Caldari suits work with no reps?
I know that running around with 50 armor hp missing is concerning, but by that time I'm on a 5 kill streak. Does anyone really complain about not being on full-hp anymore in their 3rd or n-th engagement? I don't think our main focus should be balancing suits for their ability to go on 10-kill streaks.

I dont understand why as a Caldari player, I need to armor rep? I don't use armor mods at all. why not provide a better NPE to highlight this?

Why are we using reactive/rep instead of regulators? for our tiny armor base? our armor shouldnt even be considered as part of our defense.

why is armor reps mandatory on a shield tanking suit? our shield tanks must not be strong enough if this is the case.

Helping New players that don't understand that they need to rep
Helping Shield tankers use their low slots for regulators instead of always allocating one to a reactive/rep for that minimum 1hp/s
Helping versatility, ferroscale usually gets dumped for a reactive, kincats, etc. Having a mandatory slot requirement to be reps is not fun

Your complaining about getting something for nothing? It's a buff to everyone except the Gal Scout.

The idea is to give all suits some armour repair.

Not necessarily give them adequate armour repair.

2. Personally, if I had innate reps I'd drop a regulator to fit more armor on my Caldari suits. Isn't that the logical thing to do? This is an honest question, I'm not trying to be provocative here.

I'm all for it but, shouldn't we be making shields more viable ? I am full armor tanker on all my suits and I think that shield tanking in dust is still not quite right and I haven't even bothered to train into them in the years I have played dust.

Overall I think its a great change but will only further the dichotomy between armor and shields; leaving shield behind by a hood margin. Tread lightly around this change since it will open up the ability to buffer tank without reppers on and, on some suits, an extra plate would make them a little unbalanced.

TL;DR

Love it, potentially destabalizes balance, shied need to be heavily prioritized after this change

I'm not a Dev (clearly lol) but in answer to this particular point, I have gotten feedback several times from shield focused players (running Caldari suits or occasionally Minmatar) who want to fit a regulator (or a second regulator) but feel at least some on board reps are essentially mandatory for long term engagements (not talking constant sustained fighting, just long spans in/near combat zones without death).

While there may well be some who would fit more armor in the proposed context, as well as some who simply refuse to fit armor for their own style and/or RP reasons, the are certainly a segment of players who wish to devote their lows to Shields rather than Armor, so long as they have at least a minimal level of on board reps. The proposed change would provide exactly that.

Cheers,
Cross

I'm all for it but, shouldn't we be making shields more viable ? I am full armor tanker on all my suits and I think that shield tanking in dust is still not quite right and I haven't even bothered to train into them in the years I have played dust.

Overall I think its a great change but will only further the dichotomy between armor and shields; leaving shield behind by a hood margin. Tread lightly around this change since it will open up the ability to buffer tank without reppers on and, on some suits, an extra plate would make them a little unbalanced.

TL;DR

Love it, potentially destabalizes balance, shied need to be heavily prioritized after this change

Thanks for taking the time to elaborate.

There is indeed in issue with the ability of shield suits to maintain full combat effectivity through a chain of firefights. If I want to be able to go on a 30 kill streak in a shield suit I'd better bring repair nanohives. And if I bring those I may just as well fit armor.

However, I don't think innate reps are going to fix any of that. Those that want to be able to fight forever without dieing will keep fitting armor and repair nanohives since something like 2 hp/s isn't going to be enough anyway. And they will need the ammo too. Anyone else will just downgrade their repper and upgrade their plates.

Then we have the issue that we're introducing innate armor reps across the board because we're trying to make a few Caldari Assaults fit more regulators - which, in a weird twist of fate, receive the smallest rep bonus of all. So in an attempt to make CalAssault fit more regulators we buff Minmatar Commando innate reps. This hardly seems like a targeted change there. For some reason in the currently proposed numbers all armor based suits are receiving bigger buffs than shield suits. I can't really see who asked for that.

Again, I don't mind the changes. I'll just eat that rep-buff and keep stacking more armor. I can turn those buffs into better performance on my G/1 and A/1 pub fits. However, I'm trying to say that this change probably won't have the impact you're expecting it to have.

Also a godsend to us poor benighted logis, it's very hard to stay alive without passive reps.(I'm also very surprised that nobody has come out with the derpslayerlogi argument. Refreshing)

If 1 - 3 HP/sec armor rep rates make logis into slayers then we have far bigger issues to address.

Also, going to agree with you regarding the Minmatar's repair rates being so close to Gallente. Gallente should trump all other race's innate repair rates by a wide margin. I would leave the Caldari and Gallente's the same (as proposed), then make the Minmatar match the proposed Amarr rates.

Hey Rattati!

Can we have a spreadsheet with:
Race
Suit
Armor at max skills
Innate Repair Rate
Time from 0 Armor to Max
?

I think this could highlight an issue with the very low repair numbers on Caldari Sentinel

Do not underestimate the community's bizarre obsession with slayer logi's.