WH Changes: The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

Well, we've been asking for it and so here it is; the first major changes to wormholes since 2009.
However, now that they're here, are they actually good?  Well, that depends on who you ask so let’s discuss the WH changes coming in the Hyperion expansion.

For those who have been living under a rock, the dev blog can be found here:
http://community.eveonline.com/news/dev-blogs/into-the-known-unknowns/

This dev blog outlines 6 major changes that CCP are looking to implement in the next expansion.
Some of these are excellent changes that we've wanted for a long time while others? Well, not so much.


So let's start with the good.

1.  Bookmark copying changes.
This is the smallest change of the bunch with CCP upping the limit on how many BMs can be copied at once and speeding up the whole process.  The final numbers are not yet confirmed but Fozzie advised it's looking to be in the 20-30 BMs at a time range.
This change has little impact on single corps due to the corp BM system but I'm sure the alliances out there, WH or otherwise, will appreciate it.

2.  Dual static C4s.
C4 space has been the butt end of many WH jokes in the past due to its horrendous kspace access, poor resources and generally empty chains and dual statics have been asked for by basically everyone who isn’t a giant carebear living in C4s purely to run solo sites with marauders for more or less as long as I can remember.
This change will open up much bigger chains in general and make C4s and C4 statics premium real estate for PVP centric corps who like having large chains to hunt in.
I expect the C4s with C4 and C2 statics will very quickly attract many corps.
This one is my pick by far for the best change coming.

3.  More and new roaming WHs.
CCP are also increasing the spawn rate of all WH originating roaming WHs to further increase available connectivity and interaction.
Again this is a great change people have been wanting for a long time.
There are also brand new roaming holes being introduced that can spawn in any class WH and lead to any class WH or nullsec.  These new holes will have high total mass but will have extremely low jumpable mass, restricting them to frigate and destroyer hulls.
I'm a bit on the fence with these new holes to be honest.  I don't really think the add anything meaningful to wspace and while yes, they make it real hard to lock your system down as they are effectively unclosable, frigate fleets are not a thing in WHs and I highly doubt these holes will have much of an effect on that.
I would much rather CCP just add normal mass roaming WHs to C4-6 space as they are currently only in C1-3 space.
Still, more connections are great so overall the change is good.

4. WH anomaly rebalance.
I guess this was inevitable at some point, even if I think it is largely not needed.
The anomaly rebalance is pretty good overall with no major holes in it.
I'm not going to go through every system type completely as you can just read the changes in the dev blog but here are the highlights.

- Black holes getting a large revamp.  Turret penalties completely removed, agility penalty halved, missile bonuses added for velocity and explosion velocity. 
This is good news for black holes as they have been utter garbage since forever.  Should lead to interesting missile kite comps from its residents that visitors will need to be prepared for.

- Magnetar is getting a target painter effect reduction to offset how popular they are for PVE.

- Red Giant is getting a damage bonus to bombs.

- Pulsar is getting a bonus to neuts to make Chimeras more killable there.

- Wolf Rayet is getting its armour resist bonus changed to armour buffer bonus as well as having its small weapon damage bonus doubled. 
This is one I don't like at all really.  The resist bonus was not an issue here at all.  The only thing I can think of to warrant this change is if they are also planning to buff capital reps in the near future which may have needed this change.  The small gun bonus has always been irrelevant since it's only useful IN the system and if you can't follow your enemy through holes with your fleet comp, you're not going to fly that fleet comp very often.  Additionally, with the new roaming frig only holes, Wolf Rayet residents are going to be hit super hard if frig gangs become a thing.

- Cataclysmic Variable if having a remote cap transfer amount penalty introduced to nerf spider tanking.  Very good change which should make the unkillable pantheon Archon fleets that people who live in these holes a thing of the past.

Overall these changes are well handled and, in particular the Black Hole changes, should level out a few of the bumps in the current WH weather.


So there we see the 4 good changes in this expansion, not let’s look at the bad.

5.  Mass-Based Spawn Distance after Wormhole Jumps.
This is the black sheep of these changes.
Basically, CCP want to make every ship spawn out of immediate jump range of a wormhole with the heavier the ship, the further away it will spawn.
There have already been two 40 page threadnaughts on this change on the WH forums and both have had very minor support from a few players who basically just want to watch wspace burn and huge levels of opposition from all sorts of WH groups who hate this change because it will effectively destroy our way of life.

This change makes it impossible to roll wormholes quickly and leaves your rolling ships stranded up to 25km away from the WH with no way to jump back.
It means smaller groups cannot roll holes with any level of security as they cannot protect their ships from larger attackers.  It means that if a small group rolls into a large group they cannot fight, they can't just role the hole and continue looking for content but they are instead stuck with a hostile static that they can do nothing with or about until the larger group rolls it or it times out.
It also means people can no longer chain roll for content, people cannot use mass to effect fights on WHs to their favour, combat rolling becomes a thing of the past, committing caps to kspace fights becomes a non-event and committing caps even to fights in your static gains an unacceptable level of risk.

As for those saying this is a good change as it will make rolling fleets easier to catch, you're looking at it completely wrong.
Yes, if the change goes in and people make zero changes to their rolling process then it will make them super easy to catch.
But do you really expect that to be the case?
People are inherently risk averse any this change will just make them NOT role the hole if there's any chance of being caught which will give you even less chance to kill them than now since they won't even leave the POS.
Yes, there will be stupid people who are careless but those people are super easy to kill even now so this change still has no benefit for you there.
Catching collapsing ships is really not that hard right now, you should learn how to do it rather than complain about it.

I don't understand why CCP feel this change is needed or wanted.  Fozzie advised that the change allegedly came from a player and that it was later brought up by Chitsa in his CSM term but I have never heard anything even remotely this absurd raised on the forums.

This is by far the worst change proposed for WHs. 
If it goes through it will dramatically change WH living and will force people to from larger groups for security as small groups in WH space will have no way to maintain their system's security against larger forces.
While it hits small groups super hard, it also impacts large groups negatively as they will not be able to look for PVP in the manner that they do with chain rolling and will not be able to coming cap groups to fights through WHs.
Not to mention the giant pain of just routinely rolling your chain to get a fresh one.

I continue to urge CCP to fully scrap this change and if you have not posted in the feedback thread yet, I would suggest you do so.


Luckily there is only the one really bad change but it does leave us with one ugly change.

6.  K162 Signature Appearance
People have been rightly complaining about how easy it is to spot new WHs every since the sensor overlay rubbish was introduced.
In order to address it, CCP are looking to change the WH spawn mechanics to only spawn when someone jumps through a new WH, rather than when they initiate warp to it.

Really?  Is this issue really that hard?
I mean, sure, this changes the problem but it doesn’t really address it.
Bottom line is that the issue is the sensor overlay and it picking up new sigs immediately.
This level of free and instant information is just NOT what WHs are about and the entire system should never have been introduced in wspace.
Unfortunately, CCP are not willing to even consider changing it now that it exists so here we are with this half way measure.

The correct solution here is to leave WH spawning as is but put a delay on the overlay picking up new sigs, something in the 5-10 minute range is all that is needed.
Note that the delay should be only on the overlay, NOT on probes.
This would leave the current system as it is for the most part but would reward people who take the extra step of actively scanning to check for new sigs.
It really shouldn't be that hard but CCP seem insistent on over complicating the matter and so here we are with their ugly change for it.


Overall, these changes are all overshadowed by the horrible change that is mass based range spawning for WHs.
I would rather have none of these changes than for that change to go through.
I really do think it will have a hugely negative impact on all forms of WH life.
I know CCP are still discussing it in light of the hugely negative feedback so here's hoping they come to their senses.