Ships & Modules

You should try an ENI. Its fast as hell. Neutron Gank, dual armor reps and XL EpicFail ASB all work. Im just starting to use it recently, but there are people in FW (X Gallentius for one) that use them very successfully. Its faster than the Stabber and exactly the same speed as the SFI. Its basically a really fast Thorax with slightly less EHP. It has a smaller drone bay, but it does the same overall damage because of the dual damage bonuses. I am finding it really fun.

Consider the ships more so than the setups.

It could just be a question of different experiences, but i have not really seen any revolutionary ramifications of either if- or how the ships were used then or are used today.

I'm not saying that's a bad thing, quite the opposite actually, it tells me the fitting changes were balanced.

It's just that i considered most of the ships you listed powerful in their element before, and i have not seen them used in many new ways since (at least not beyond what the AF changes have achieved).

I've seen you complain about tracking on medium blasters before. I believe the case was a Thorax orbiting a Brutix. I do fly medium blaster ships; I'd say between a third or half of my kills are with me in a Brutix or a Ferox, normally with Neutrons, and I can't say that when fighting other BCs I have any tracking issues. With that said, against other BCs, neither of those two ships really want to orbit, a properly fit Ferox is only out tanked by a Drake (possibly a Prophecy as well), and a Brutix wants to get as much DPS out as possible. Of course, against Battleship guns, then orbiting is the way to go. However, as previously stated, I think your issue was with a Thorax and a Brutix at which point I have a few questions;

Were you using Electrons, Ions, or Neutrons? What ammo were you using; since we're talking up close, I guess either Navy Antimatter or Void. A couple of important things to remember is the larger guns do do more damage and have greater range, but they have less tracking. Electrons have a good amount more tracking than Neutrons do. Furthermore, both Void and Null have a tracking penalty. If you were using Neutrons with Void, check to see what happens if you downgrade to Ions or Electrons or put in Navy Antimatter.

Thank both of you above for the answers. I appreciate that you are trying to help. However, it appears I have been unclear in my complaint, so I will try to simplifiy:

1. Medium electron blaster thorax (the highest tracking medium blaster) vs. Large Blaster Naga or Talos or Megathron.
2. Medium electrons with Antimatter have an optimal of about ~1500-1800ish (from memory - I dont have eft here so correct me if I am wrong).
3. Unless I keep transversal up against the Naga/Mega/Talos, I will melt before I melt them. Therefor I cannot just approach or keep at range.
3. Because I am using medium blasters, I am fighting inside scram range, so I am scrammed and possibly webbed.
4. So, solution is to use transversal and my smaller sig to avoid some damage while I am pecking away at them with my smaller, better tracking guns (supposedly). One of the ways to do this is by orbiting. If there are other ways (which it seems people are suggesting in this thread) then please someone enlighten me.

So, I have set orbits at 800ish (your velocity will make the actual orbit still your optimal).

I have set orbits at 1500ish (your velocity will make the actual orbit slightly outside your optimal and in falloff).

In both cases, with the new turret graphics, you can see a lot of misses in those situations. Test it yourself. Though - admittedly, I dont know how accurate the graphical representation of misses is. So I wanted to check it.

So, I put it into the damage calculator in EVE HQ (I think I used a Naga as the target) and it showed hits (again - from memory here) 60%ish with antimatter and 50%ish with void - while inside blaster optimal range. I dont recall what the 'quality' of hits was.

Regardless - 50-60% hits inside optimal while orbiting a ship LARGER than your gun resolution seems low to me. I know it should not be 100%, but it shouldnt be 50-60% either. Perhaps that would be ok against a ship class that is your same size, but against a larger target, that seems low to me. It is completely possible that I have used the damage tool wrong, but the results seem to support the graphical representation of hits/misses in game.

Thus, my complaint that the tracking on medium blasters needs to be increased. If there is a better way to reduce transversal while increasing my ability to hit inside my optimal range against a larger ship that can blap me without high transversal then I would like to know.

Does that make sense?

I am not at home to test, but have you tried the other weapons systems in similar circumstances and seen how they do? Or even setting up the exact same test but with small blasters against a cruiser hull? See what kind of variance you get there too, this would help narrow down if it is an issue specific to medium blasters.

Just curious, if nothing else it should provide a good litmus test so to speak.

I know this is going to sound harsh, but this is why you should stop valuing EFT DPS and start relying on real DPS. That's the secret for why I fit ships like this: http://eve-kill.net/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=12579270

-Liang

I dunno, I'd say that medium guns are fine because they still track significantly better than the opponents. If you fit for applied DPS over theoretical DPS you'll see much better performance in general - but especially as compared to your opponents.

-Liang

This is a great idea. Ill futz around with it if I get a chance. Work aint so accomidating right now though.

And my point, which you are not reading or understanding, is stop trying to fit the fight into how you think it should be done, and fight your ship the way it needs to be fought. Stop being so focused on ensuring you are fighting in optimal, and fight where you have the advantage. Do you see how liang fit his ship? Look at his low slots. Look at what that does for his damage projection, and what it does for his tracking, together it's a double impact.

I guess because I fight all weapons, the only time I really focus on optimal is lasers, since they have large optimals and tiny falloff. Projectiles can't hit anything in optimal unless both ships are just about stopped, so I don't really sweat it. Blasters are a cross, sometimes you want to be close, other times optimal +1/2 falloff is fine. Oh and blasters don't have a tiny optimal, that would be projectiles. If you absolutely have to be in optimal to feel ok, you should train amarr and lasers. That would better suit the style you feel is necessary.

Tracking computers would work fine too, but they take more fittings and a mid slot. Mid slots are for ASBs.

-Liang