Missions & Complexes

My main is currently in a micro jump drive CNR and is skilling to make it more effective. Question I have is there an upgrade?

I'm looking at either the NIghtmare or Paladin. I'm really tired of missiles and want pretty lasers to shoot.

Excuse me if I'm wrong wouldn't this make suiciding a paladin much easier since they can't move.

Yes. And no. Bastion mode adds 30% to hull resists as well. You're looking at 74k ehp against void ammo. Plus, you don't need to bling out a Paladin to get ridiculous numbers so is it profitable to suicide gank a paladin?

Speaking of bling, if you're willing to pop an extra 110M isk, you can swap the MARII for a Corpum C-Type MAR (more tank) and drop one of the EANMs for a DCII (8m45s of cap.) For 95k ehp against void...

Just be aware that if you DC while in bastion your ship will NOT warp off. CCP still hasn't said if this is intended or not so completely relying on bastion for one's tank is in my opinion going to result in the loss of a ship sooner or later.

You seem to keep repeating this bad idea of putting a MARII on a Paladin in multiple threads. 400 dps tank, while stationary, is not going to be enough for some missions unless you always waste time MJDing away to 100+km. It also has the down side of complete toilet paper tank outside of Bastion, meaning you can never ever come out of Bastion while under fire.

There is no reason not to put a LAR II on it, and using a MAR II also completely wastes the 100% bonus from Bastion in terms of armor/cap. Sacrificing tank for DPS is a good idea, sacrificing tank for no additional benefit is pointless.

It really depends on the type of PVE the OP is doing. If he is running anoms in null then a MJD paladin would probably be the better choice due to the extra range although he would be taking a big risk of getting tackled with bastion locking him in place and the warp speed changes coming with rubicon.

If he is just running L4s then a non MJD/Bastion paladin or a nightmare would be the better choice since the NPC usually spawn within 50km of the gate. He also won't have to mess with burning back to gates after he MJD out or worry about DC with bastion and potentially losing his ship.

I have made many posts comparing the nightmare and paladin and the truth of it is they are practically the same ship the only difference is one uses shields and the other armor tanks. The differences in DPS, tank, and mission completion times will be hardly noticeable and if you want to nitpick then you really can't say which ship is better since the nightmare will be better in missions where the enemy is close thanks to it's tracking bonus and the paladin will be better in mission where range comes into play and thanks to bastion giving ewar immunity it will be the ship of choice for sansha blockade and vengeance.

Either ship can run missions just fine and you would have to really screw something up to lose one. My advice to the OP is to look at your skills and see which one takes the least amount of time and use that one.

Maybe a little bit. You can use bastion mode to tank the gank, or you can use your MJD to escape. I think if you're worried about ganks you can MJD as soon as you enter each pocket (also to position yourself to MJD to the next gate), making those catalysts have to fly 100km to come get you. Which means you will have a good chance to have enough time to exit bastion, and MJD further away, and warp out.

The MJD is there just because Marauders have a MJD bonus in Rubicon. I don't see much of a need for it in level 4s, and wouldn't fit one. YMMV.

As for the apparent over-reliance on Bastion mode, that's what the MWD is for. IIRC, 110km is about the max range you'll need to deal with in level 4s. With a 95km optimal, you can sit still in Bastion mode, wipe out the pocket, and then MWD to the next gate (if movement to the next gate is even required.) As someone who flew a Vargur/Golem with a ~350 tank (Pithum C-Type MSB,) the only movement I did involved moving to the next gate and pre-aligning for warp.

If ~350 tank is the minimum for level 4s, then getting ~400 tank with something as *basic* as a MARII and a couple of EANMIIs means that the Paladin is super-tanked. Which means it is trivial to boost the tank with cheap deadspace MARs and/or faction EANMs while still having the convenience of being cap-stable-ish.


IMHO, between the 95k optimal and MARII tank, the Rubicon Paladin is potentially a candidate for a nerf in both categories. (Unless it's successful in PvP, in which case CCP will probably leave it as is.)

tl;dr - The whole point of the fit is to point out that you would have to try hard to screw up a Paladin fit in Rubicon.

Me? CNR, and...
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uh, yeah - CNR.

vOv

navy geddon pwns nightmare