Ships & Modules

i think tracking is very underestimated. some people think if they can see numbers and not missing, they track fine. but if you start stacking the tracking mods, you will see a lot of high quality shots. This is why sentries are great, they fight in optimal range 100% of the time and their low alpha but high rof means you dont overkill your targets.

With sentries out, they are stationary, but far away, when rats fly toward them, the transversal of the rats is reduced, so they are easy to hit, and in effect kill. Not much tracking is needed when enemy has low transversal.

When sentries are not out, you move far away, then let rats chase you. Again, when they chase you, the rats fly straighter, so your turrets don't have to move much to track them, so you score more hits and/or better hits, kill them faster. Variation on the chase tactic is kiting. Kiting would work against bs size rats, but frigs, cruisers and bc rats would be able to close with you so the further out you start, the more time you have to kill stuff.

The second scenario was just my guess at the tactic to be used. I don't fly domi at all. You can always use Jack of Diamonds (LMJD) to jump 100km every 3 minutes, that will let you open the range, come to stop, deploy sentries, kill stuff.

1)Anything small enough to require movement to reduce transversal is also small enough to die in 2 shots max, so even constantly adjusting your movement shouldn't force you to drift outside of scoop range by more than a few meters.

2)I've posted the fit many times on these forums, but you need perfect skills (which I have) and t2 425s, with 3 faction MFSs, a t2 burst aerator, and a few damage implants. I also like using javelin ammo in my rails, which does add like 12 DPS over faction (I use it for the extra tracking, and swap to AM to pop rats past ~30km). On a slightly less useful note: If you happen to be running damsel in distress, you can actually use blasters and ogres instead of rails and sentries, and your damage goes up to 2008 dps It isn't terribly useful but it is one of the most entertaining things you can do in a level 4 mission.

3)Honestly the tracking issue was more of a general statement. Nothing bigger than a cruiser can get under your guns even sitting still in missions, and for the frigs-cruisers gardes work quite well. If you're having a hard time hitting things with your guns, get better gun skills.

The rattlesnake is a great ship if you know when to use it. Level 4 grinding is not the place.

If you dig around the posts I;ve made on this forum you can find the exact fit, but the gist of it was:

6X 425mm rail IIs

Mids to taste, though I go for very little tank as most missions I don't even use the booster.

3 drone damage amps
3 faction MFS
1 fitting mod (I think it was a PDS, but it miiiight be an RCU)

Hybrid burst aerator II (the rig only gives something like 60 extra dps, but I find I notice the difference when playing since the guns fire about a second or so faster each cycle)

1 shield rig to taste (I'd go for kinetic or thermal, since those are the rats you want to be shooting anyway, but again, tank is almost completely irrelevant on this fit)

Bring some gardes, ogres and hammerheads (ogres for missions where you need to travel a lot and hammers to clean frigs)

Toss in some 6% implants for gun ROF and large hybrids because why not

USE T2 AMMO FOR THINGS CLOSER THAN ~25KM. The tracking bonus is very nice, though the DPS is the same as faction AM.

If memory serves this should put you somewhere in the 1400s for DPS. I did manage to crank 1500 out of the domi using rails, but the fit was gimpy and at that point it was just eft **** waving.

EDIT: I just checked and the fit I was linking used cap rigs not weapon rigs, I think I wound up sticking with those since cap got a bit hairy in some of the longer missions, it's been a few months since I've actually bothered running missions Still does 1429 DPS though so w/e (the weapon rig one does 1486 with my skills, and if I got large hybrid spec to 5 it would actually do 1500 on the dot

MWD Mach: 14:59, 16:58, 15:50, and 18:50

are those all for blockade time? thats pretty amazing, i can never do it that fast in mach , maybe a mwd might help

1) Never, EVER take advice from battleclinic, it's a well known fact that most of the info/fits there are shite.

2)I pop BSs and BCs just fine in the 20km> range with 425s. I have to move if I want to hit a cruiser but again, they go down in 1-2 shots (and that's assuming that they get into a stable orbit, which they shouldn't)

3)Remember that rails have pretty good falloff. Even with jav loaded you're still doing 1300dps at 35km, and you don't drop to 1k dps until past the 50km mark (but again, it's best to use AM for things farther than 30)

4)Can't stress this enough, but the rattlesnake is bad for highsec missions. I say this having flown all the main mission ships for quite a while, and having pretty good skills in damn near everything. The mach, domi, and nightmare are the kings of lvl 4s, but all 3 require very nice skills to work well. The rattlesnake SEEMS good because your support skills are meh, and that's a good time to be flying it.

You either dps tank, kill the rats, no more agro on the drones. Or you scoop the drones to protect them.