NEBULOUS: Fleet Command update for 23 March 2023

We've just crossed the one month birthday for the Protectorate Update, and to celebrate we've got some balance changes to address the biggest issues that have been brought to our attention. We tested the major update for quite some time with a broad range of testers, but there are always going to be some issues that slip through the cracks in a game with this many moving parts, so thank you for bearing with us.

All three of the primary areas of changes have a significant overlap, but I'll try to cover them individually here.

NEBULOUS: Drift Command

In hindsight, it was probably a bad idea to balance plasma around the ability of the highly maneuverable AN ships to dodge in the hands of a skilled player. This opened up a pretty major skill gap between players who knew dodging was possible and those who didn't. The primary culprits in this were linear acceleration buffs from the Raider drive and the fact that FLANK throttle gives an additional 1.5x boost to acceleration. Throttles were only ever intended to get you somewhere faster, not to have combat dodging implications.

We've rebalanced some of the Alliance drives to reduce these buffs and increase their negative effects. Additionally, FLANK throttle will still provide its 1.5x top speed bonus in all directions but the linear thrust bonus will only apply in the forward direction. Finally, in order to help close that skill gap, the EVADE maneuvering posture will cause ships that are stationary to randomly translate around their stopped position.

Capital Survivability

While these drive changes seem like a nerf to the Alliance (they are, but mostly for frigates, which we'll talk about in a second), having a more narrow skill gap between dodging and not dodging allows us to better balance Plasma.

Originally, we made plasma hits devastating because they were so slow and easy to dodge with certain engine configurations. With the reigning in of dodging, we've reduced the armor damage of plasma so it will not strip the armor off a huge area of a CH or BB in one hit. We've also improved the splashing logic to create a more even spread and not apply damage to the same spot twice. Plasma also originally had very long range so you could soften targets before getting into 100mm range, but once again this created a punishing micro gap where players who were traveling in a straight line would take the full brunt of plasma salvos at 12km while players dodging would not be hit at all.

We've also reduced the armor penetration of rockets so that leakers getting through capital PD will not immediately do devastating damage and knock the PD offline so a second salvo can finish the ship off.

In all, these changes should significantly increase Alliance capital survivability and reduce micro load.

Frigate Blobs

The most frustrating problem brought to our attention by players was the trend towards fleets of 10 frigates, which were just not fun to play against (or really to play as). They're a small target, they're highly maneuverable, and they have excellent redundancy because hits to one ship won't reduce the effectiveness of others. The drive changes above were a big component of making these fleets more vulnerable, so they can't just set a tight perpendicular orbit and dodge every shot at more than 4km. Removing the power output from the small Raider variant also prevents them from being stacked on smaller ships without creating power concerns.

One of the big strengths of these fleets was their ability to rely on RPF to cover their PD needs. The volume of RPF in use often led to them being invulnerable to missile salvos in addition to dodging every shell. The probability of RPF doing damage to missiles has been reduced in order to force more build sacrifices in these fleets by creating a tradeoff between DPS and dedicated PD.

Full patch notes follow:

Changes/Features:

• Flank speed 1.5x linear thrust bonus now only applies in the forward direction, top speed in all directions is unchanged.
• Increased FM280 and RM580 Raider Drive's flank damage to +50% (was -30%).
• Decreased FM280 and FM580 Raider Drive's linear motor bonus to 30% (was 40%).
• Decreased FM280 Raider Drive's power generation to 0 (was 300).
• Decreased FM230 and FM530 Whiplash Drive's flank damage to -15% (was 25% and 35% respectively).
• Decreased 400mm Plasma Ampoule armor damage to 30cm (was 45cm) and range to 8.4km (was 12km).
• Smoothed out armor damage of splashing damage slugs (e.g. Plasma) to prevent double application.
• Decreased R-2 Piranha Rocket armor damage to 38cm (was 70cm) and increased armor damage radius to 4 (was 3).
• Ships holding position while set to EVADE will shift laterally in random directions.
• Reduced airburst damage probability of 120mm and 250mm RPF to 50% (was 80%).

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed thrusters receiving flank damage when only turning the ship and not providing any lateral thrust.
• Fixed Focusing Element Misaligned debuff being triggered by battleshort damage.