Hmmmmm another option might be to remove basic suits all together. Just have the suits with bonuses?

Say **** off to the basic suits? Then people wouldn't have to skill into so many suits...

How about this as an interesting option. Basic race skills unlock the specialzation dropsuit skills for that race, but they themselves do not unlock dropsuits. You only need to get it to 5 to unlock some of the dropsuits skills *logi/sentinel*, but the basic skill doesn't unlock any suits. It maybe, gives them a bonus or is only used to unlock racial dropsuit specizalations.


I guess my point is, just, somehow, people need more access to the suits without the skill buffer. I would love more debate on the subject as well : ) I just really believe this is core to the future of the game and I'm glad to see the CPM take an interest in the topic, my personal solution isn't as important to me! As long as CCP knows it's important to ease up the path into suits without taing away the long training times overall.

And thanks for everyone who is taking part in this thread : )


Do we NEED basic suits? Would eve benefit from a rifter with no bonuses as a per-rep to a rifter with bonuses?

btw I aggree that people might be getting too many prototype suits to quickly with my original proposal. I think having x10 skills and basically getting rid of the x6 basic suit skills is now my opinion on a good fix.

Plus you can't use the special suits, because why use them when you've already got a prototype suit of the same model? You need to level it up to at least 3 or 5 before you can use those suits more often. I think the basic suits might kinda.... just mess with the progress curve of the game.... I no longer believe they add anything....

well ^^ in eve you train a single skill to unlock that class for all races....

Maybe we need Specialaztion skills to be Independent of race.

So keep all 12 race/size skills, and then have a new tab that unlocks specilzations. If you level up scout you should get use every scout as long as you train that race/size suit.

The rest of what you said is also every interesting, adding different bonuses to basic suits, but right now I'm focused purely on how we can change the current skill system in a few weeks to better cope with what we have now.

I'm honestly not sure I can come up with any better ideas right now :P So.... hmmmmm

There should be 4 new skills.

Minmatar Basic suits
Ammar Basic suits
Gallente Basic suits
Caladri Basic suits

Each one of these unlocks all 3 basic frame sizes. They are x5 skills like they are now and getting it to level 5 gives you access to all 3 prototype suits of that race. As well as light/medium.and heavy standanrd and basic suits.

Basic proto-suits should all lose a slot somewhere with this change.

Now when you level one of these up to 5 it would unlock all 6 specialization skills. Lets be honest these suits are the meat of the game. And once you level up a single race, you should have access to all 6 specialztions that race has to offer. The old system made since when there were only 4 suits, but we are going to have 24 suits now just to start and the current skill system will be hard to navigate and have more than 60 skills just for dropsuits!

By dropping the light/medium/heavy skills for racial skills the whole game becomes more balanced and fun. Allows you to pick a specilzation without dumping skills into a new basic skill just to branch out.


If not then al basic dropsuit skills should drop to x2 at the max. And specialaztions can stay the same if CCP really wants them too. However I want to know why we shouldn't make the game take less skills to gain access to the better dropsuits. Why limit people on the basic suit they choose to level up? It doesn't feel right.

I like the idea you could also link a faction bonus to the basic skill that applies to all of the factions dropsuits. This way all the faction dropsuit would become more familiar. But then the multiplier and the Dropsuit bonusses needs some adjustments...

For example:
Minmatar Basic suits + 2% Sprint speed / Level
Ammar Basic suits + 5% Dropsuit Armor / Level
Gallente Basic suits +1HP Dropsuitselfrepair / Level
Caladri Basic suits + +5% Dropsuit Shields / Level

The bonus from the specialization skill should obviously be different from suit to suit.

Right right and it would make sense then why every suit has one of the same bonuses. Because it's shared across a single skill but then each race adds a twist.

So if you want to use a Minmatar Scout and you allready have scout trained to 5, all you need to do is train at least one level in minmatar light dropsuits. 3 for advanced, 5 for prototype. But even the standard would get level 5 bonuses. Which would rock hardcore.

Also I agree that basic suits need bonuses as part of a change like this. Think about it to you devs reading this. Your eve counterparts have even started adding bonuses to the rookie ships. So lets get on track and add a single bonus per level to basic suits, and then have the 2 other bonuses only be on specialized suits.

There should be a way to make this work while keeping the tree view.

Depends on the intended role of the suit within the class. For example you could have multiple of the same racial suit in the same class, but they'd have different roles and bonuses from the same skills. The EVE equivalent is having the Jaguar and Wolf as assault ships; one is geared towards fast shields and kiting, the other towards armor tanking and brawling, but they both use the same ship skills.

EVE has a nice modular skill system that allows for extra ships to be added if deemed appropriate. Dust in its current state would seem to require entirely new skills should we ever want extra sets of suits with different bonuses.



Well, you'd still have to train Minmatar Light Dropsuits to 5 to actually use the Minmatar Scout suits. I was also supporting the idea of removing suit tiers (standard/advanced/prototype) entirely. Somewhat controversial, but I believe it would be good for the health of the game.



What I find interesting is how the team in charge of DUST 514 is making a lot of the same mistakes that CCP did with EVE Online, but at an accelerated rate. It's pretty fascinating, but it also speaks volumes about how much more communication may need to happen between the devs that work on EVE and those that work on DUST. I believe the CPM and CSM can be invaluable in bridging that gap.


IWS actually had a thread about dropsuit restructuring in the F&I section.
Might want to move the conversation there? Supposedly the Council Chambers is for discussing the CPM.
https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=75214&find=unread

Depends on the intended role of the suit within the class. For example you could have multiple of the same racial suit in the same class, but they'd have different roles and bonuses from the same skills. The EVE equivalent is having the Jaguar and Wolf as assault ships; one is geared towards fast shields and kiting, the other towards armor tanking and brawling, but they both use the same ship skills.

I love it. But I'll do you one better to make minmatar even more awesome. +2% movement speed per level. There is nothing in the game to raise normal walking speed. So same sprint speed but 10% faster strafing.

There should be 4 new skills.

Minmatar Basic suits
Ammar Basic suits
Gallente Basic suits
Caladri Basic suits

Each one of these unlocks all 3 basic frame sizes. They are x5 skills like they are now and getting it to level 5 gives you access to all 3 prototype suits of that race. As well as light/medium.and heavy standanrd and basic suits.

Basic proto-suits should all lose a slot somewhere with this change.

Now when you level one of these up to 5 it would unlock all 6 specialization skills. Lets be honest these suits are the meat of the game. And once you level up a single race, you should have access to all 6 specialztions that race has to offer. The old system made since when there were only 4 suits, but we are going to have 24 suits now just to start and the current skill system will be hard to navigate and have more than 60 skills just for dropsuits!

By dropping the light/medium/heavy skills for racial skills the whole game becomes more balanced and fun. Allows you to pick a specilzation without dumping skills into a new basic skill just to branch out.


If not then al basic dropsuit skills should drop to x2 at the max. And specialaztions can stay the same if CCP really wants them too. However I want to know why we shouldn't make the game take less skills to gain access to the better dropsuits. Why limit people on the basic suit they choose to level up? It doesn't feel right.