Ships & Modules

I don't think that everyone focuses on DPS/gank in a site like Battleclinic, except if you are talking about PvE fits. Its simple there, gank is king -.

Also, you have to take into account the application and the environment a fit is designed for. Buffer fits are used in null for fleet duty for obvious reasons, and are also used in LS because repairing there is not an issue. Buffer fits also have another advantage, in that they are far less susceptible to capacitor warfare, a common factor in many engagements.

Ultimately though, I think you are being too broad in your assumptions for others to provide feedback. The optimal loadout for a hull changes according to the environment, the application its designed for, the presence of logi and EWAR etc. Do you have a particular hull or loadout in mind?




Again, there are many scenarios where you DON'T have the time to stay there and tank the damage taken. You have to be more specific.

Because most people don't have a clue what they're talking about, and their goal is to stroke their e-peens instead of providing actual useful feedback. (After all, why would you give fitting tips to a potential enemy?) There is a plethora of other useful properties other than DPS, such as tank, range, damage application, EWAR, speed, agility, engagement profile, power projection, etc. etc. - and all that only on the scale of a single ship. Once you start adding up different ships to form a fleet composition, the universe of variables expands rapidly.


You are overlooking the prime reason for buffer armor tanks in the first place: logistics. If your logistics can repair more DPS than the enemy fleet can throw at you, the only thing determining your survival is whether you can live long enough for your logistics to lock you and start applying reps. But you are right, without logistics and without any way to repair one's own armor, buffer armor tanks are very vulnerable to attrition over a few fights; and generally not recommended. They have their use when you don't expect to fight an even fight - e.g. if you're hunting enemy ratters, you don't particularly need to sustain huge bursts of damage. You need to be able to kill your target and get out before reinforcements arrive - this is where your DPS matters.


What's wrong with your thinking is that if you can out-tank one enemy ship, the hostiles can bring two. If you can out-tank two, they can bring five. As fight size increases (and even in single-digit number of ships), your local tank rapidly becomes mostly insignificant compared to the DPS you will receive. Only with dedicated logistic ships or using several specific setups (TIIIs, marauders, command ships) can you withstand such punishment for any period of time. Without these, it's purely a race between who can kill the other fleet first - and to win that race, you need to do more damage and you need to have a bigger buffer.

Moreover, even in solo situations, sitting there, tanking all the DPS your enemy is doing and slowly grinding them down is undesirable, as it gives them plenty of time to call for backup. Especially in 0.0 it is often a race against time to kill your target before the locals find you and get on top of you.




Disclaimer: My comment relates to standard day-to-day combat in EVE. This advice doesn't apply to any academical "what-if-1-v-1" scenarios or artificial un-EVE "prearranged tournaments". I have no expertise in these matters.

While it is possible to extract significant tank numbers from a ship it is very difficult to find a ship which, fitted for all out tank, exceeds the potential of a similar ship fitted for all out gank - at least in terms of T2 and low faction fittings.
Therefore if an all out tank version of the ship met an all out gank fit its tank would be insufficient and the key deciding factor in the engagement becomes the tank of the gank ship and the buffer each has to chew through.

As gank is far easier to achieve than tank, most will begin from that starting point.


Buffer tanking rarely considers more than one fight - whether you have an offline repper fitted, a friend or an alt with remote rep or rep drones (small remote rep in spare Armageddon highslot anyone?) or whatever else the logic is based around the amount of time it would take an active rep module to equal or exceed the HP value of a buffer module - with armour fits this may define the number of slots available for weapon mods and therefore the viability of the DPS setup. With the rise in popularity of Logistics ships the focus shifts towards resist rather than raw buffer but to operate a pure resist fit risks lock time issues from your logistics and therefore plates or extenders still have their place.

buffer armour is for ewar. because you need two webs, scram, prop, capbooster maybe....

DPS is a way to tank because the quicker you pick off a target then you've gained that time you didn't have to worry about receiving damage. A tank is only as useful as the amount of time it spends being the "target". In pvp the idea is to focus fire down any series of targets one at a time in order to reduce the need to tank and mitigate your own losses. Unless you can accurately predict who within your group will be focused first and thus prepare by "tanking" allowing your allies to focus the enemy faster and preventing the need to tank further, if you cannot predict this target correctly then the tank role is null void.

That's why in other MMO or group based games where the enemy uses a measurable targeting system or "aggro" the tank becomes a vital role because he can accurately retain that focus and be useful.

DPS then becomes the vital stat because it is all you can really rely on.

ps. I cant math.