Disclaimer: The views expressed are those of the author’s alone. The author does not represent Eve News 24 or any other entity. That being said, enjoy the article!
It has been almost two years since the first Tactical Destroyer class vessel, the Confessor, was released. These ships have taken the meta by storm since their introduction and have reigned supreme as the most used ship on zKillboard for quite some time now. Many have complained about their dominance, citing that these ships (one in particular that shall not be named here) are “overpowered” and “cancerous”, spawning many memes to this effect.
That which shall not be named still reigns supreme, almost two years later.
Well, it seems that CCP has finally heard the calls. On SiSi right now are some rather drastic changes to all Tactical Destroyers, with nerfs hitting the Svipul and Confessor harder than the Jackdaw and Hecate. Here are the numbers:
If you don’t feel like delving deep into the numbers, here’s the tl;dr: the biggest change is to sharpshooter mode, which will now provide a damage bonus and extra resistances against enemy sensor dampeners and tracking disruptors. To balance this, sharpshooter has lost its scan resolution bonus, and the inherent damage bonus to all Tactical Destroyers has gone from 50% to 33%. Their mass has gone up as well, coupled with a change in propulsion mode from a passive speed boost to an active one, effectively making all Tactical Destroyers a little slower. The Svipul has lost some power grid, making fitting a little more difficult, the Jackdaw lost a midslot in favor of a lowslot, and the Hecate has received a 200 hp buff to its structure.
Changes to Tactical Destroyers have been desired for quite some time now. Though I’m a little disappointed in CCP for taking so long to do something about them, I must say that the changes they’ve come up with seem absolutely fair to me, specifically the fact that instead of taking the easy way out and neutering all Tactical Destroyers, they decided to apply the strongest nerfs to the Confessor and Svipul, recognizing the fact that the Jackdaw and Hecate, while strong, were not even close to being on par with their Minmatar and Amarr brethren. As a devout lover of the Hecate, I’ll enjoy ganking unsuspecting victims and surprising them with a hull tank.
All in all, this is absolutely a good change for Eve Online. Personally, I’d still like to see CCP take a look at Assault Frigates, as they have been essentially rendered obsolete since the introduction of Tactical Destroyers. The devs certainly have their hands full with the upcoming Ascension expansion, but maybe they’ll get around to addressing Assault Frigates someday. A man can dream, right?
All credit for the graphs goes to u/Mu0nNeutrino, who also provided an excellent analysis here.
Muffin Paladin is EN24’s resident grammar hound. When he isn’t flying with the Iron Armada, he drinks too much coffee and makes fun of Salivan’s use of commas.
