Missions & Complexes

Heya all you mission runners!

So my primary ship when I feel like running some level 4's is my Tachyon fitted Paladin, which works well enough for most missions -- it melts through Blood Raiders and Sansha's like butter at 80k range, and I have no problems clearing most missions efficiently.

However, I am quite tired of it's performance when it comes to other npc factions, most notably the Angel Cartel -- I let out a deep sigh every time I get missions like Angel Extravaganza since my Tachyons do almost no damage to those close-orbiting, EM-resistant Angels and clearing these missions takes ages.

I imagine I'm not the only one using a Paladin for Level 4's, so.. what do you guys do when you run into an Angel/Gurista (or other slow) mission?

At the moment I am thinking that I should train up for a Golem and switch between the two depending on mission type and mood.. what other options are there? The Tengu? I haven't actually looked into T3 cruisers much, how well do they do at Level 4's?

Any and all opinions are welcome.

Machariel.

Tengu/CNR/Sentry+Rail Domi are also all somewhat competitive if you have more fun flying one of them.

Mach or Vargur, especially since you already have guns trained. You can get by with faction 800 ACs (Barrage is optional) to avoid the long training time.

Golem is probably a waste of time.

Tengu is good for blitzing Angels, and very good against jamming Guristas.

Nope:

Cruise-Raven is a piece of shite: Can't tank, no capacitor, and takes forever to lock and kill anything even with good skills...Ugh, I hate it, and can't wait for a Tengu!

Tengu with T2 or Meta 2-4 sucks some serious arse in terms of tank, and is a little on the low-end in terms of DPS.

A Tengu with faction modules, however, kicks serious keister. A faction-fit tengu, like the fit listed below, has a tank that is somewhere between 800 and 1700 DPS (depending on what faction is shooting at it), moves at 680m/s, is cap stable, targets out to 117km, hits out to 113km, and puts out about 740 DPS. Combine those stats with the fact that it has a very small signature radius (compared to most L4 mission ships) and incoming damage from any L4 mission is negligible. You specifically mentioned AE4, and I can say from experience that the fit below can not only complete the mission without breaking a sweat, but can also do AE4 Bonus Room and barely even show any damage to it's shields.


[Tengu, 10MN - 6 T2 Heavy Launcher]
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System

Republic Fleet 10MN Afterburner
Pithum A-Type Medium Shield Booster
Pith X-Type Shield Boost Amplifier
Caldari Navy Invulnerability Field
Phased Weapon Navigation Array Generation Extron
Phased Weapon Navigation Array Generation Extron

Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile

Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit II
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit II

Tengu Engineering - Augmented Capacitor Reservoir
Tengu Offensive - Accelerated Ejection Bay
Tengu Electronics - Dissolution Sequencer
Tengu Propulsion - Fuel Catalyst
Tengu Defensive - Amplification Node


The drawback to the fit listed above, obviously, is the price tag which will come in at about 3 billion ISK. Not only is this amount a hefty sum for most Eve players, but it can also make you a juicy target for gankers. The risk of getting ganked in this, or any expensive ship, can be greatly lowered by taking the time to setup insta-undock bookmarks at the stations you typically use, by jumping through stargates as soon as you land on them, and not travelling via Auto-pilot (Auto-pilot is stupid for any ship at any time in any security space. Period.).

The amount of ISK spent building the above fit could be lowered by using slightly less effective or smaller size deadspace modules (such as substituting a Pithi Small shield Booster, or a Caldari Navy Shield Boost Amp), but I would much rather get the best equipment than have to deal with losing a 2.5 Billion ISK ship cuz you tried to save a few hundred million and got into a situation that the inferior equipment couldn't handle.

There are some people that swear by Target painters on a PVE Tengu (dual ones so TP cycle time vs launcher cycle time is not an issue) and some people swear by Missile Rigs. I prefer Dual TP's, but that is just my personal preference. I used the fit above for about a year, never went into armor once during that time, was able to tear through missions faster than with any other L4 mission ship I have owned, and even walk away from the computer during missions if the phone rang or dinner was ready.

Certain ships in the game (Nightmare and Mach) would have slightly higher DPS if setup correctly and certain ships (Rattlesnake and Dominix) would require less "work" to missions in. Some ships may excel at one aspect of running missions or an other, but in my opinion no other single sub-cap ship has the complete package (a balance of great DPS, enough range to hit orbiting NPC Battleships, phenomenal tank, fast speed, cap stability) that is equal or superior to the Tengu.

Guristas are easy to tank (kinetic) so use a mid slot or two for gravimetric ECCM (and you are using the Dissolution Sequencer, right?) Increasing your sensor strength reduces the chances of being jammed. You will still get jammed but not nearly as frequently as with most other ships.

Use a mission guide (eve-survival.org) to prioritize killing ECM ships.

The classic grossly overpriced, completely unnecessary Tengu fit.

Makes me smile every time. haha

I wouldnt leave the hanger in that ship. This is all you need and it is less then a Billion if I remember had it about 10 months now.

You can put a damage controll II in the lower slot or use four BCU's for a little more dps whatever. The Caldari Invul is really nice but a T2 will work fine until you can get one or not. I had 2 of them so I use them. 3 billion tengu? Whatever for

Ballistic Control System II
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System

Caldari Navy Invulnerability Field
Explosion Dampening Field II <----- Whatever mission
Republic Fleet 10MN Afterburner
Caldari Navy Shield Boost Amplifier
Gistii B-Type Small Shield Booster
Gistii B-Type Small Shield Booster

Heavy Missile Launcher II
Heavy Missile Launcher II
Heavy Missile Launcher II
Heavy Missile Launcher II
Heavy Missile Launcher II
Heavy Missile Launcher II

Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst II
Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst II

Tengu Defensive - Amplification Node
Tengu Electronics - Dissolution Sequencer
Tengu Propulsion - Fuel Catalyst
Tengu Offensive - Accelerated Ejection Bay
Tengu Engineering - Augmented Capacitor Reservoir

Getting a little off topic here aren't we? :p

Are you guys saying Tengu is better than the other choices for the Level 4's in question? If so, why?

There really isn't one king of all ships. It's all subjective.

The majority will agree that a tengu is one of the best options for blitzing/LP, whereas there are many ships that are very good for mass slaughter for bounty ticks like NM/Mach/various marauders and any other top end ship. The more bling you put on it, the more effective it is, but you've gotta start somewhere smaller to earn said bling anyway.

If I had to start over, with knowing what I do now, I would have skilled for the tengu immediately. In my opinion, considering weapon training time as well as time to skill for the ship, it's probably the best bang for the buck option. You can run missions very effectively in a simple T2 fit tengu with 2 small pithii or gistii boosters, costing well under 1b. T2 HMLs are faster to train for than T2 large turrets for any of the pirate battleships, and the damage is applied easily at long range even with less than perfect skills.