Yacht Redundancy

So apparently CCP Fozzie has been talking to the Council of Stellar Management, or member(s) thereof, about nerfing what has become a blight of W-Space under certain circumstances. Hole rolling Luxury Yachts have become a pretty common sight and I freely admit I have a couple for my low skilled alts to use. I've talked about them at length previously but I suppose I never really appreciated just what a scourge they would become at the time. For me they have been a way to create content, not avoid it, but increasingly it's the latter that has seen them popularized by many W-Space occupiers.

Most recently I've seen them used during the siege of a C4 system when Wingspan repeatedly denied access to system by applying critical mass to every connection as it appeared. To be clear, what the Luxury Yacht can do can also be done by a Tech III Strategic Cruiser, the significant difference is the skills that are required. You can train an alt into one in less than a day, a Strategic Cruiser takes months. The result is a proliferation of Luxury Yachts that, barring an immense fuck up by the pilot, are impossible to stop from rolling a connection from right under your nose. Wingspan have the required proliferation of young pilots, so they took full advantage. It does make me curious if it was Chance Ravinne, CEO of Wingspan and CSM Member who raised the issue with CCP Fozzie. I'd be pleasantly surprised if it was the case.

A popular solution being suggested seems to make fitting Higgs rigs impossible to nullified ships. Whilst this would solve the issue, it would also make the use of Tech III cruisers in this role redundant. Since the use of Strategic Cruisers wasn't anything like the problem we see with the Yachts, I don't see this as a viable alternative. It's not a matter of skill point elitism, it just wasn't a major issue and when it is seen, it could be dealt with.

A far more effective solution would be to nerf the power grid of the Yacht itself. Without the ability to fit an oversized afterburner, the mass of the cruiser would be insufficient to make it an effective hole rolling ship. That said, I wouldn't particularly miss Tech III rolling cruisers, they do limit engagement opportunities by their very nature. Seal clubbing rolling Megathrons is still fun, after all. =]