Today is the day we get the Surgical Strike update for EVE Online. The real question in my mind is how appropriate that name actually is.
Normally tax day in the US, but this year it is July 15th
A surgeon uses special tools, like a razor sharp scalpel, to make deliberate and precise cuts in order to repair, reshape, or remove aspects of the human body. I am not sure how that compares, by the analogy the name suggests, with nerfing every damage resistance module in the game by 20% in the hopes. And doubly so when CCP comes out a day later with a mea culpa that they totally didn’t consider what this would do to PvE or suicide ganking.
The latter makes you wonder if they didn’t run this past the CSM or if 9 out of the 10 CSM members being PvP focused gave them the same blind spot that CCP obviously had. Or maybe CCP discounted their feedback. Who knows. But today the big patch landed and it does at least seem like they got some of the feedback related fixes in with the main patch, so I will give them credit for that at least.
The big hit this time was damage resistance modules.
- Reduced effectiveness of all resistance modules by 20%
- Includes all active and passive armor and shield resistance modules.
- Does not include resistance rigs or damage controls.
This hits PvP, of course, and will cause ships to explode more often as their effective hit points, EHP, drops. But it also hits every mission runner and miner and high sec hauler. And the change is noticeable in your fits. My Apostle, even with a somewhat outdated fit, has about 84% of the EHP it had yesterday.
The Day After
In response there is a lot of refitting theory crafting going on and the Imperium told their pilots to stand down supers and titans for the next week while the fit team comes up with new approved configurations for the big ships. That is because the big toys also got an additional nerf:
- Super Carrier and Titan Plate bonus reduced
- Super carrier bonus to plates and extenders reduced from 400% to 200%
- Titan bonus to plates and extenders reduced from 500% to 300%
So a lot of EHP was shed today.
And, just to keep things interesting today’s update also included a tiericide run for the active shield defense modules, so a bunch of shield modules have new names and new stats. Confusion reigns! The list is long and I’m not going to paste all of that here. Go read the patch notes.
Super carriers also got a nerf to heavy fighter explosion radius, which makes them less effective against sub caps as well as a balance pass so that all the base super carriers now have the same number of fighter tubes.
There were also a lot of other ship changes, listed out below:
- T1, Faction and Pirate Battleship base hp increased by 10%
- T1, Faction and Pirate Battleship base scan resolution increased 30%
- Muninn
- Damage bonus reduced from 7.5% to 5% per level
- Optimal range bonus reduced from 7.5% to 5% per level
- Eagle
- Max velocity reduced from 202 to 190
- Powergrid -40
- Loki
- Powergrid reduced from 670 to 550
- Bonus to projectile range and falloff reduced from 10% to 5% per level
- Loki bonus to projectile tracking reduced from 7.5% to 5% per level
- Legion
- Powergrid reduced from 700 to 625
- Deimos
- Hybrid damage increased from 5% to 7.5% per level
- +50 PG
- +20 CPU
- Increased Scan Resolution by 30% for Marauders and Black Ops
- Redeemer increased from 170mm to 220mm
- Paladin increased from 120mm to 160mm
- Golem increased from 105mm to 140mm
- Widow increased from 115mm to 150mm
- Kronos increased from 120mm to 160mm
- Sin increased from 140mm to 185mm
- Vargur increased from 145mm to 180mm
- Panther increased from 155mm to 200mm
- Marshall increased from 180mm to 235mm
- Increasing Freighter Hit Points by 20%:
- Providence Hull increased from 100K to 120K
- Providence Armor increased from 46K to 55.2K
- Providence Shield increased from 10K to 12K
- Charon Hull increased from 77.5K to 93K
- Charon Armor increased from 15K to 18K
- Charon Shield increased from 50K to 60K
- Obelisk Hull increased from 110K to 132K
- Obelisk Armor increased from 40K to 48K
- Obelisk Shield increased from 14K to 16.8K
- Fenrir Hull increased from 65K to 78K
- Fenrir Armor increased from 22K to 26.4K
- Fenrir Shield increased from 48K to 57.6K
- Bowhead Hull increased from 50K to 60K
- Bowhead Armor increased from 15K to 18K
- Bowhead Shield increased from 22K to 26K
- Force Auxiliaries are now limited to on-lining 1 (one) Capacitor Booster
The nerfs to Eagles and Munnins are attempts to reign in null sec’s current fleet darlings. Likewise, Lokis have been the T3 of choice for a long stretch. And that last item… well, faxes won’t be repping so hard now that they’ll run out of cap sooner. Death to supers.
And then there is the attempt to make brawling great again.
- Increased damage of Void, Conflagration, Hail, and Rage ammunition (Small, Medium, Large and X-Large) by 15%
We’ll see how that plays out, though I suspect if you can’t get those who favor kiting in range that damage boost won’t help much.
And the new Avatar model, which I tried out on the test server, is now live in game.
The new Avatar model in the hangar
And then there are a whole bunch of the usual tweaks and fixes. This is a pretty substantial update and will lead to a bunch of fitting and doctrine changes. As usual, I tend to be a fatalist on this sort of thing. I just go out on fleets to blow things up, so more things blowing up might be great… but then I might blow up more as well. We shall see.
Anyway, the patch has been reported up and live. The patch notes are here. There are also feedback and known issues threads live in the forums.
Time will tell as to whether this update becomes one of legend or one we forget and whether these are changes we curse or bless as we move forward.
Other coverage:
- INN – Surgical Strike to the Meta
- The Nosy Gamer – Resistance is Futile
- Ashy in Space – Life After the Nerf
- Evehermit – Sucking Lemons
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