Warfare & Tactics

So I remember back a few patches ago, I saw a chart that implied that CCP wanted there to be a few categories of damage oriented combat. There were attack, combat, and bombardment ships.

'Combat' was your frontline, high tank fighter, 'attack' was your fast, high damage variant. It seems to me that there was an ambiguous middle tier they wanted as 'bombardment' which made me wonder if each race still kind of has that middle tier.

I've wondered if missiles (and drones to a lesser extent) are a kind of indirect fire kind of weapon. Bombardment would function as a weapon damage application that would come in conjunction with a more disruptive kind of way of fighting. It would kind of be agnostic of your position on the battlefield as your damage application wouldn't be depending on your speed or to a lesser extent your distance from the target. It'd also be a more generous fitting issue on average for these more 'bombardment' classes. Bombardment ships would force the enemy to alter their normal way of fighting the typically higher DPS ships first.

At the t1 frigate level, I think the breacher with its 4 mids, 3 launcher hardpoints, and 2 light drones seems best situated for this followed by the kestrel with 4 launcher hardpoints and 4 mids, then the gallente tristan with its 5 light drones, and finally the amarr tormenter with its 2 light drones and fast switching laser turrets.

The support cruisers then seem to carry this capability one step up, with the exception of the caracal for the Caldari.

This is then carried into the combat BC line with the Prophecy, Drake, Mymidon, and Cyclone being able to fit into the same role.

Then finally at the BS level you have the Armageddon, Scorpion (for ECM disruption), Dominix, and Typhoon all in a similar role.

The point of bombardment DPS isn't so much that it is hitting the hardest, but that it is likely strongly coupled with a way to often easily mitigate oncoming damage making its nuetralization more difficult than a straightforward attack ship, or a less threatening heavy tackle brawler.

I don't think they fit in my taxonomy of bombardment. For me, bombardment is:

1) Positionally agnostic (missile and drones contribute most to positionally agnostic damage)
2) Significantly survivable (combat lines of ships with the most mids along with range dictation)
3) Tactically disruptive (extra utility highs and the sacrifice of a tackle mid for an EWAR module)

T3 BCs aren't really any of these, except maybe the third. But I really think of non-tackle utility mods as often being the thing that gives these ships their bombardment disruption.

How about a Tristan with Neuts/Nos and Dragoons with Neuts and Light Missiles?

Both are heavy hitting drone boats in a small package.