Missions & Complexes

Going by this: http://wiki.eveuniversity.org/NPC_Damage_Types ... it doesn't look like thermal dmg is the best type to deal against any NPC rats at all. Looks like when it's EM/Thermal, EM is still recommended (I'm guessing they have slightly lower EM resists?)

So is there any point in PvE'ers buying thermal dmg missiles/proj ammo? If you do use thermal, who do YOU use it against?

Phi Operation Protector is weakest to thermal (by a wide margin). Angel elite frigates are weakest to thermal. Damn near everything is second weakest to thermal. A case can be made that thermal is actually the best all-around damage type even if it only rarely gets the highest mathematical advantage.

For projectile ammo you have to keep in mind that there is short, medium and long range ammo and that those - from short to long - have a decreasing base damage. So, even though a NPC might be weakest to kinetic damage choosing Phased Plasma (short range with big thermal part, small kinetic part) might be better than Titanium Sabot (medium range with big kinetic part). In fact I amost always use Phased Plasma against Serpentis and Mercanaries, unless a NPC is quite far away so that Titanium Sabot is likely to be the better choice.

At least for some of the NPC groups the listing in the EveUni article are just rules of thumb that are more or less good and that might have other opinions. Mercenaries are an example: eve-survival (Damsel mission as example) recommends using Therm/Kin as damage type against them instead of Kin/Therm which EveUni and the NPC database recommend.

If you look at the NPC details for Mercenaries (enter "Mercenary" as Entity Name in the search box) you 'll see that it's not that easy: There is quite a mix of resistances for the most common types (Overlord, Commander, Lieutnant, Corporal, etc.) and they all have different weakest resistances on shields and armor and some are primarily shield tanked, some armor tanked. If you could change ammo type instantaneously and would be willing to accept a hectic ammo-change-click-fest the best choice would probably be to change ammo after you have broken their shields and before you continue with armor. But that's no real option of course. In practice choosing thermal or kinetic damage against Mercenaries depends more on the mix of the specific NPCs you are facing. Or again, Phased Plasma is most likely always the best choice when it comes to Mercenaries and projectiles because there is no projectile short range ammo with kinetic as primary damage type. Using missiles... I don't know. Just try thermal vs. kinetic missiles, you'll probably barely notice a difference (except you fly a ship with a bonus on one or the other damage type of course) - and if there is a difference it mostly goes into "over-damage-waste" anyway.

For other NPCs it's simpler to decide. Angels basically always = Fusion or Nova (again disregarding ship boni on damage type) because they almost all have weakest resistance against explosive damage on both shields and armor (btw including the ("Arch") elite frigates, I disagree here with Zhilia Mann above who claimed that they are weakest to thermal, I can't see that in the NPC database).

Very nice post. Thanks for your input. What you're saying makes total sense and I'll definitely use your advice!

I use T2 weapons and as such mainly use T2 munitions, Barrage (AC) / Tremor (Arty) for long range and Hail (AC) / Quake (Arty) for short range.

Most of my ships are fit for in your face short range combat so I use a lot of Barrage and Hail. I also carry Republic Fleet EMP and Republic Fleet Phased Plasma ammo for the tougher NPC's when needed.

I don't use T1 munitions for the simple fact I trained up to use T2 weapons. T2 munitions actually helps destroy NPC's faster.

Plus I don't have to worry about which Damage Type to shoot, it's either short or long range ammo depending on the range of the NPC.



DMC