Hyperion

Be careful what you wish for is the adage most appropos to the proposed changes coming in Hyperion.

I'm a regular troll/reader of features and ideas, though often of course i don't comment on stuff i have no interest in. Like all the industry rebalancing in Crius. Whatever. However, the proposed changes to wormholes I am of course intensely interested in - so here we go.

Small-ship wormholes: 5 Stars
As i have stated on the Wormholes forum, there'is a lot of misguided opposition to these which is predicated not upon the idea itself, but people's individual game play styles, elitist bullshit, hidebound indoctrination (the whole armour tanks for wormholes crap) and bling factor pimplants in 2.5B ISK pods.

None of this addresses gameplay issues which may arise from introducing these wormholes. The mass allowance, lifetime, destinations and inbound habitats of the wormholes have nothng to do with individual player's inabilities to train Frigate 5, small weapon specialisation 4 and buy a fucking AF In fact, i think there should be more of these things, available to more places including K-K as well as J-K  varieties - especially lowsec.

This is because, for a start, there's nothing at all wrong with assymetrical fights. if you can't figure out how to build an AF doctrine, ceptor doctrine and bring logi frigates, then you lose out and are vulnerable to others. This creates an opportunity for emergent gameplay, including collapse HICs traversing them, etcetera, and hence it's a good move.

K162 Spawn Change: 5 Stars
This is self-evidently awesome for getting pew pew. Bueno.

Mass-Jump Spawn Equation; 0 Stars
Fighting on a highsec connection is about as lame as station games. Every so often a Stabber gets a solid bump on someone fucking around on your B274 and skittles him 15km off the hole, but usually they jump in, tank till they get scurred, and jump out. Repeatedly.

Currently, there's little emergent gameplay (aka tactical options) to be found in addressing wormhole brawling on highsec. You either mass the hole, cloak orcas, or just ignore them. This is bad, boring lame. This change ought to address the 80%+ safety margin of closely spawning on wormholes as it currently exists. There is nothing wrong, per se, with making cruisers spawn on average outside jump range.

However, the ranges and equations presented, where caps can be up to 40km off the hole, is anti emergent gameplay, because it will actively discourage pushing large ships (orcas, caps, freighters) through wormholes. i mean, OK, arguably rolling C5 holes can be achieved too easily, but that's because we play a game. Games have rules. When they are understood and fixed, games become enjoyable because you compete with others to exploit the rules (legally) and gain advantage. Changing the rules drastically not only forces you to rethink the game, but actually in a way destroys the game. People have been playing C5 cap shit for years. The game is proposed to be destroyed and replaced by a new game - of course people will make a decision not to play this new game. new players will step forward and play the new game. If the new game is functional.

People don't play games which are unplayable. in my view, the proposed mass-jump spawn mechanics are unplayable. Reasons;

• Why don't caps cynoing in for lightyears of travel randomly spawn up to 40km away from cynos? Because nullsec CSM and people would Q.Q too much. The same physics and theories ought to reasonably apply. Ergo, this change is idosyncratic to wormholes and penalises cap warfare unduly.
• It is physically impossible for capitals to get back to hole. Ever. Even on a good spawn. At best an orca takes a minute. More if you hull rig the shit out of it. Carriers, dreads or freighters slowboating 40km? Forget about it.
• The solution, requiring Rapier webs, a pounce, a second webbing,and same on the other side, exposes a capital to too much risk. 
• People will stop rolling holes, end of story. Currently if you are good you can ninja-roll a C5 connection if you have a scout and good intel, and disappear yourself before anyone can respond, because it takes 10s. This allows small groups to roll away from the big groups (like SSC, LZHX, AHARM, HK) and cntinue playing a game. Being hell camped for 24hrs connected to a big group means people will just sign out. Being signed out is bad gameplay. 
• As pointed out, BS will now instantly spawn at ranges allowing smartbombs. Emergent gameplay for C6 Red Giant fights, agreed. Terrible for shipping down and small gangs being camped by larger gangs. 
• Cloaking is now easier, for everything, including orcas and capitals. You won't get decloaked easily if you start 40km away from the hole. But is this good gameplay? 
• Dreads will spawn, potentially, at optimal blapping ranges. Good gameplay? Possibly not.
• Inability to safely jump orcas and caps will prevent rockspidering wormholes to collapse for PVP opportunities. 

It seems this is "under review". I hope so. it's a shitty idea, but CCP loves shitty ideas (even Chitsa is now ignoring the fact he put it in the hat as CSM, it's that shitty) and when CCP deciddes on something they rarely change their mind.

The benefits (no hisec gay) are outweighed by the drawbacks (no ragerolling, no controlling wormhole mass to trap, etc etc). However, it can be tweaked. If capitals and orcas only spawn within jump range 5% of the time, say, it might add that element of risk. Or make it equally risky for everything, regardless of mass. Or make doubletap time dependent on mass, say 2 minutes for frigs and 10 minutes for capitals. That would be equallly interesting and far more emergently gameable.

Dual Static C4's: 5 Stars
Fuck yeah, screw the neckbeard yokels, your hole is about to be busted open.

 Wormhole Effect Changes: 2 Stars
This is an incredibly complex set of changes, which even i am yet to get my head around. This does mean CCP also has no idea what their changes are going to do. I mean, CCP Fozzie is proposing it, and we know what he's capable of (c.f. Ishtars) and we know what wormhole effectscan do at the C4+ level (AHARm magnetar exploit). So we should expect a few exploits and windbacks in 6 to 11 billionty months. here's my take on it:

Magnetar
A favorite because of the extra DPS, which favours gank and brawling, and uber-fast ISK-efficient farming. The changes to TP's are more going to affect farming rates in C5 and C6 space than balance PVP. If you want to do damage in a Magnetar, you bring tracking Dreads, Tornados, or Enyos (small weapon tracking is ridiculous as it is). TP nerf is meaningless. So, mostly unchanged except Q.Q  for the C5 farmers.

Pulsar
CCP is adding a neut buff and Nos buff (think: Bhaalgorn) to help people crack triage Chimeras and/or Phoenix in the C5 and C6 Pulsars. The effects are significant but essentially meaningless otherwise, unless you latch on to an active tanked pimp Tengu in a C2-3-4 and can blap his cap.

Red Giant
What the fuck, who cares about bomb damage? So you might be able to fully cap escalate a site and rain bombs on the Sleepers and bomb them off the field (wait for the video). Otherwise a worthless change. 0/5 Stars.

Cataclysmic
Cat vars are getting a peculiar set of changes, again to address the C5 and C6 level gameplay factors. There's more local capacitor, which is holding back solo Tengu site runners currently, who also suffer the nerf to local reps. So more capacitor to farm solo = more residents, in theory. The changes to remote capacitor transmitters are skewed to heavily affect capital modules versus subcap modules. This will be meaningless for most Guardian pairings, but may be an extremely adverse effect on Archons cap chaining. This is a complex issue - if the nerf is too severe you won't be able to keep a web-TP loki capped up in a C5 site. You may not even be able to cap chain capitals in C2's decently, which affects people's build decisions on trapped caps. Time will tell, and will require a lot of EFTwarrioring. TBA/5 stars.

Wolf Rayet
Again, this is mostly directed at the C5 and C6 level, in that resists are more important for capital-level fights and landing triage reps on field. Doubling the buffer of a Proteus in a C6 isn't going to really affect the damage taken, it just prevents blapping.

but the buff to small weapon damage? Which it seems most WR bears are unaware of? OMG, 684 DPS C3 / 1,023 DPS C6 Enyos with 15K EHP buffers and sigs the size of small peas? Fucking whut. Shit is about to get REAL. 11/5 Stars.

Black Hole
This is contentious, too, and again a complex problem for the ugly step-child of wormhole space. I lived in a C4 BH for a year, found it fun, especially facing 100MN Tengus, Cynabals and Dramiels.

Now it will become an über missile Caldari fag hole. 100MN Tengus, 100MN HAM Legions, Orthrus, Barghest, Nano torp Ravens spewing torps 100km with über explosion velocity.

Gank citadel cruise Phoenixes farming sleepers solo with über buffed Citadel Cruise with actual decent missile parameters. Golems of Doom, solo farming C4's and C5's forever. What could go wrong? Blap Phoenixes everywhere, for a start. 3/5 Stars