My point exactly, keep vis and stats same for all I care, vis lower, even....Pump that thrust abit

There is no way one of the most powerful HF engines in game (LT, PLT, ULT) should be low vis. If you want low vis you do need to give up something, thrust/turning or size. I understand that snipers are just as heavy as zerks in a lot of cases but that doesn't mean you should automatically get an engine that is the best engine in game without drawbacks for being low vis.

Why should there be drawbacks for being low visibility? We already have so many drawbacks, there doesn't need to be any more...

If that is true, then snipers should get fields that give them really high vis in exchange for higher thrust and turning, just like how zerkers have travel fields to counter their low speed.

Ok, if you think that way, Wolf, we can take away the resists bonus for being a zerker, as well as half their shield bank. Now we can have a powerful engine for zerkers.

Don't be a hypocrite and say that to move well, you need to sacrifice size or vis when you don't want to do the EXACT same nerf to your own side of the focus.

Different classes, different concessions, i go 50speed. It makes no sense what so ever that a lion thruster the best HF engine in game should be low vis, thats like asking for ghoulstop to have 22 thousand bank and the same regen as emp protector. It has nothing to do with the class bonuses and everything to do with balanced stats on equipment.

HF is both visible and stealthy.


That makes it the best VISIBLE HF engine in game. The best one is an engine that can service both the stealthy long range sniper, and the brawling close range zerker.

The stealth engines you refer to are SEER engines, not SNIPER. Just because they start with the same letter and both are hard to see doesn't mean both are one and the same. You should know this by now.

Oddly enough....i agree with churchill. Weird.

Anyway, yeah; Look at seer versus SD; Seer turns a little bit slower, and accelerates a little bit slower, but it doesn't matter, because they reach their max speed in about the same amount of time, possibly faster. To the perspective of the seer, they are perfectly agile.

Being perfectly agile for your ship class is the ideal goal for your class, what everyone strives for and 95% of people succeed, because its something that just nags, nags, nags at you until you scratch it! But with this change, snipers are going to have an unscratchable itch, because there simply is going to be NO way to scratch it!

Movement is significantly different from, say, shielding. You can survive with a shield that has massive bank and low regen because of chargers, because of shms, because of drones. But how can you survive with an engine that has no thrust, or no turning? You cant, there is no modification you can easily obtain that will change those parts of your ship. Sure, you can use tweaks, but why should one class be forced to use tweaks CONSTANTLY to achieve the same results? If that sort of thing is necessary, it indicates a problem with the system, not the class.

OK, I'm uploading the latest engine stats onto test now. I *think* the latest numbers have addressed everyones concerns. 98% or so off all engines are better than they are on live, just better by different amounts. Visibility on "non stealthy" engines is much more in line with what it was before. LT is vis 298 now versus 300 before. Most engines haven't had their weight substantially changed, with the exceptions being very low tech ones. All "stealth" engines are significantly better than before.

Please take a look and let me know if there is still anything that you see that doesn't look right.

Ok, things are just about perfect once again. Thank you, Jeff, you're a real hero.

Capital engine got nerfed, not cool.

Besides that, everything looks nice, though grape may be rather OP now. You nearly doubled the thrust of it, and turn got a significant boost as well.

EDIT: Quiet Thrust has always been unique for being the only engine available to players with 0 vis. It now has 10 vis. Please fix?

you know what else starts with s? stealth. something that both those classes are centered around, while the ULT & LT arent.

While both may be stealthy, they do not have much else in common.

While this may be stealthy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seawolf_class_submarine

It cannot be really compared to this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-117_Nighthawk

The Seawolf is a Sniper.
The Nighthawk is a Seer.
The Seawolf's engine section is the mass of 10+ Nighthawks.

This rebalance gains my approval.

However Jeff please please look at the Bule Abadi Darkness. it is a very expensive and rare ruin item that requires the ruin skill to use.
current stats on test are
Test/Live
Tech-19/19
Thrust-3800/3700
Turning-1070/1035
Weight-321k/180k
Vis-10/8
Size- 68/60

Capital Engines are problematic because they are labeled as tech 10 when they are supposed to be balanced as tech 20. I will beef them a little bit more, though, by making them think they are from Free Market.

I could make the Grape Influence and FT "slightly stealthy", which would reduce its stats. Though lots of engines ended up with huge beefs like that one in order to balance out with some of the other high end engines and fit along the usual power curve that all items have.

Quiet Thrust never had 0 vis, but rather 0.002 vis, which mattered in the old stealth/visibility system but is pretty indistinguishable from 0 in the current one. My thinking on it now was that 10 visibility seems like a reasonable minimum vis for player-obtainable engines. If you guys really want, I can make a special category for just this engine and put it at 1 vis, but really, under the current visibility system, I think 10 vis is already extremely low, especially if you're tapping your acceleration key.



The Bule Abadi Darkness does get extra credit for being expensive, rare, and requiring a special skill. This is one of the few engines that came out just slightly worse than it was before, but there really isn't a way to improve it without improving all other engines, unless I make it more expensive to extract or else heavier or larger.

do all special skills count the same? Bule Mythology should be weighted more strongly than say piracy....