Community thoughts on Shield Booster?

[Forrest Gimp]

Personally I have a big fat problem with it. I genuinely do not understand why this thing even exists and particularly, what it's doing in Utility Slot? I mean what kind of Utility is it? Isn't that just a flat out buff you can stack as many times as you have slots? And engineered it just becomes silly...

Pretty much all other Utilty Slot equipment has some function, and non of these are overall good which you wanna have on each and every ship. Some require timely use plus re-arm. With Shield Booster taking something else instead feels like brutal sacrifice.

I allso have some problem with PD too, particularly with 1k ammo, I think 300 would be more than enough, but since you need at least 2 on ship to be functional, and it'snot full-auto it's fine.

What if Shield Booster would be replaced with Shield Cell Bank and Shield Booster itself go into Optional Slot with no stacking possibility (bad idea) or better yet completely got rid of (best idea)?
Do you guys think this equipment is balanced and belongs where it is?

And a side question: are shieldless combat ship builds viable? If yes, could you provide some exampes, please?

[76561198335825264]

Shieldless silent runner is viable in PVP, not for PVE because NPCs cheat and ignore heat.

Shield boosters can be considered problematic, also put the guardian shield boosters and cell banks in that same topic of shield stacking.

[Ame]

I know the resistance for shield boosters after they're engineered have diminishing returns (f.e: 2 of them might increase your resistances by 30%, but the next 2 will only increase them by 15%, and so on). If they were going to nerf shield boosters, perhaps they could apply the same diminishing returns to the shield boost as well?

To be honest, I think the reason shield boosters are the go-to filler of utility slots is that larger ships have so many utility slots and not many options. Take bounty hunting/assassination for example; you would want a kill warrant scanner (for more money), an FSD wake scanner ( to track down escaped targets), the rest can be optional. Thermal vent for lasers can be used instead of heatsink launchers, and chaff is of limited use on large ships that have the utility slots to use. We also have 2 ways of countering guided missiles, but such weapons aren't often used, and shields are already good against explosive damage; why wouldn't you make shields stronger against everything than putting something like point defence on which only effects explosive weaponry?

Maybe have a utility module that increases your ships mass lock factor, allowing an under-armed ship to escape a larger ship or a smaller assassin/pirate to trap larger prey? Or perhaps a module that can send out several decoy heat signals, making one ship look like 5 in different locations and could only be ID'ed as a decoy from close range?
I'm sure other people can come up with other ideas.

TL;DR: give more options for utility slots and maybe people will stop stacking shield boosters.

P.S: I think Guardian boosting modules are fine; they can't be engineered and provide a fixed boost instead of a percent. Also, there's already a lot of competition for optional internal slots, even for large ships.

[Kevlar]

Originally posted by Space Hobo:

Personally I have a big fat problem with it. I genuinely do not understand why this thing even exists and particularly, what it's doing in Utility Slot? I mean what kind of Utility is it? Isn't that just a flat out buff you can stack as many times as you have slots? And engineered it just becomes silly...

Pretty much all other Utilty Slot equipment has some function, and non of these are overall good which you wanna have on each and every ship. Some require timely use plus re-arm. With Shield Booster taking something else instead feels like brutal sacrifice.

I allso have some problem with PD too, particularly with 1k ammo, I think 300 would be more than enough, but since you need at least 2 on ship to be functional, and it'snot full-auto it's fine.

What if Shield Booster would be replaced with Shield Cell Bank and Shield Booster itself go into Optional Slot with no stacking possibility (bad idea) or better yet completely got rid of (best idea)?
Do you guys think this equipment is balanced and belongs where it is?

And a side question: are shieldless combat ship builds viable? If yes, could you provide some exampes, please?

It exist because it something similar existed in previous versions of the game.
why it goes in the utility slot? a question of balance between ship capabilities.

what if shield boosters would be replaced with ...?
what if not ? I mean you believe it is a bad idea, I believe that stacking is not that bad and apparently I am not alone since when the developers considered diminishuing returns for shield boosters the general sentiment of the community was so massive against it, that the idea was dropped.

in fact. why would you what to reduce ships defensive potential in regards to shields when it is possible also to stack hull reinforcements and when weapon damage output assume that shields are boosted or hull armor is reinforced
your suggestion would force all weapon output to be changed ....

ps : shieldless builds are viable both in pve and in pvp. In pve they are not popular since you end up having repair costs . In pvp they can do great things as longs as 2 or 3 packhounds penetrator missile launchers are not involved. Once they are shieldless builds start to suffer module damage that eventually will decrease the ship capability .

[Forrest Gimp]

Despite all things said, I still don't see what Shield Boosters are doing in Utility Slot, and why devs didn't think that swapping it with Cell wouldn't be a better idea. Not picking any equipment that gives you flat massive buff means weakening your ship, while pretty much all other equipment in that slot has very specific uses.

I personally don't see such a big problem with Reinforcement stacking, since even on big ship (especially big ship) which is less mobile, if you stack more Hull, you'll have less durable Modules, and if you stack more Modules, you'll have much less HP. Shield virtually makes ship invulnerable, you can still put some "magical" weapon effects on it, but you can't target Modules which is the best way to kill or disable, making it combat incapable for some ships.

So, even if we assume that Boosters can be stacked, and if community wish so that much, competition in Optional slots would be a lot better. Pilot would have to either get beefier hull or have much more vulnerable ship with thin hull and weak modules. Right now, you can just make monster, with stacked boosters, cell plus hull/module stacks if you manage to break through massive shield. Doesn't sound balanced to me one bit, or am I missing something? Does community really want that?

[semidomestic]

Because SCBs use a lot of power and generate a lot of heat. Most builds have to include a heat sink launcher just for the SCB .Cell banks and boosters do very different things, I'm sure FDev saw the problem with putting a 4 -160 Ton module on a utility mount. Boosters only go to 3.5 tons. Power draw would be another obstacle. SCBs need direct access to the shield generator. boosters are stand alone. It's the same reason KWS and wake scanners are utility, but DSS is internal.
If you don't like shield boosters, then don't use them. They do not make a ship invulnerable, and they don't really make them that much harder to kill.

[Fix]

Rinzler o7o7o7 did quite a good bit on Sheild Boosters in his Git Gud Trading guide in Open video here... linked to the relevant time (about 3:40 seconds in)

https://youtu.be/Uh9AWV_BWo0?t=221

Maybe this will help explain what Shield Boosters are good for to you.

[Forrest Gimp]

Originally posted by semidomestic:

Because SCBs use a lot of power and generate a lot of heat. Most builds have to include a heat sink launcher just for the SCB.

Can't agree with that. With engineering, you can make Cell very cool, and even in my completely unengineered Krait, I usually drop cell when I go evasive, at that point it hits around 120% heat, which barely does any damage to systems and cools off almost instantly without any heatsinks. Suffice to say I run pretty hot build with triple class 3 Beams to be sure.

Originally posted by semidomestic:

Cell banks and boosters do very different things, I'm sure FDev saw the problem with putting a 4 -160 Ton module on a utility mount. Boosters only go to 3.5 tons. Power draw would be another obstacle. SCBs need direct access to the shield generator. boosters are stand alone.

Don't see how that's relevant. We're talkikng about a game here, swapping stats wouldn't be a problem.

Originally posted by semidomestic:

It's the same reason KWS and wake scanners are utility, but DSS is internal.
If you don't like shield boosters, then don't use them. They do not make a ship invulnerable, and they don't really make them that much harder to kill.

Actually, good thing you brought that up. DSS supposed to be external module, as it allows you to shoot probes, while it's internal, for some weird reason. So they shouldn't really have a problem swapping back and forth modules. And yes, you technically can overcharge shields to silly levels, making ship maybe not invunerable, but extremely tough to crack, and you can additionally stack it with hull and modules. I don't see any tradeoff here, just makes ship as tough as possible.

Point is: besides Shield Booster being problematic equipment in terms of balance, it actually hurts choice of utility modules. Combat is inevitable part in this game, and I have hard time imagining how anyone would trade Booster for anything else, which in turn hurts playstyle variety.

Originally posted by FixxxeR:

Rinzler o7o7o7 did quite a good bit on Sheild Boosters in his Git Gud Trading guide in Open video here... linked to the relevant time (about 3:40 seconds in)

https://youtu.be/Uh9AWV_BWo0?t=221

Maybe this will help explain what Shield Boosters are good for to you.

Thanks, but in fact that's the point of my thread: they are WAY too good. If you'd mind reading text below title, that would be nice, haha.

[Fix]

Originally posted by Space Hobo:

Combat is inevitable part in this game, and I have hard time imagining how anyone would trade Booster for anything else, which in turn hurts playstyle variety..

I totally disagree, almost 400 hours of game time I'd say two thirds of that I've NOT been in combat.

Combat is easily avoidable.

The point your making is moot, Shield Boosters are good yes, but as with many outfitting combinations in ED many of the options can be quite circumstantial. Sheild Boosters do exactly what they are meant to do... buff sheilds, which is good in a PvE environment but sheilds can sometimes be absolutely meaningless in a PvP environment.

[semidomestic]

Limpet controllers dispatch limpets, but they're internal, just like the DSS.

For what the boosters do, they're in the right place. With only 4 utility slots, you have to make a choice which is more important to your role in the game. They're really not the God send you're making them out to be. I don't have them on my Krait. They use too much power (I'm running a 6A overcharged power plant). In PvE, I get more use out of Chaff,2 PDTs, KWS and good combat technique. I don't even run SCBs. The only place I've ever needed them is in a CZ, and I wouldn't take a Krait to a CZ. In PvP, well, don't fly a non engineered ship in PvP looking for combat.