Ships & Modules

Right,

So I use a mega for mission running and dedspace combats and I'm wondering where to take my skills next. I like the look of a HAC but it feels like a step down because a BS to cruiser. That thinking took me to either a command ship or a marauder.
But I've not been able to find anything about if a command ship would be any good in a solo mission (obviously has the usefulness for fleet battles)

So the tl;dr from a mega, is a good way forward a HAC, marauder aor a command ship for solo mission/ded space?

Thanks for any advice in advance

I'd vote hac. Your isk/hr will be better as a hac is faster for fairly high damage if at lower projection. The tank on a hac will be more than sufficient for a L4 and should be good for most cosmic/anoms a bs could reasonably solo. (You'll want to check that as I don't claim to be an expert)

More importantly though, if you decide to move out of pve and transition to PvP hac-V is a valuable skill to have out of the way. Particularly looking towards the hac buffs. Conversely, marauder is largely worthless in PvP and a mach can match or outperform them. That is give or take the tracking nerf v cruise buff though.

A pirate BS - HACs are underwhelming after the rebalance and I'd save the skilltime and isk for faction cruisers if you want to go cruiser sized. Same goes for CS to a large extent.

Marauders are outperformed by their pirate faction counterparts and whilst training for them, you get the opprtunity to fly more hulls than one for only marginally increased effort.

They're due for a balance pass anytime soon, however given CCPs fear of powercreep, I'd expect them to be kind of 'meh' after that too...

Spend a few billion isk on a ship for SUPER EFFICIENT MISSION RUNNING in a pirate battleship or kronos or something. Nobody ganks those anyways.

In all seriousness, I'd take the Kronos, although you may want to wait for their rebalance details to be announced Soon™.

So, let me see if I'm getting this, Kronos great for level 4's but vindicator is better
Ishtar HAC would be better for wormholes or lower sec spaces.
For deep null ishtar still good but could be better in a command ship due to more utility

From the choices you have offered, a Marauder is easily best for missioning. Sustained damage projection is the key characteristic of a mission ship.

A ship that is purely drone bonused is not going to mission faster/better than a BS. Even drone BS are slower than the standard BS's. BS kill BS faster, its just the way it is. They also happen to kill BC and some cruisers faster. A HAC has medium guns, which have range issues.. so from your choices go marauder if you want to salvage as you go along, or go big and get a vindi

BTW.. easy is not the best.. drone boats are easy mode..

Regardless of what you train should you train Gallente Battleship to 5, because Gallente has got some really nice battleships right now. You also want Advanced Weapon Upgrades at level 5, because it makes some fittings possible and others cheaper, and for all your ships. So while training for a Marauder seems to be a bit of a stretch do you get some really useful skills with the training path.

Training for a HAC is likely less time consuming for you, but to fly the Ishtar should you have T2 sentry drone skills, which you might not have yet. Therefore some additional skill training will very likely be required, but you can get into the ship soon.

Command ships are nice, but are somewhat overrated. It requires five Leadership skills at level 5 and you will not ever be able to make use of all of these skills at the same time, and often enough not be able to use only one or two of the skills. You will have spend a lot of time on getting access to a new hull without having done much or anything for your other ships. Command ships therefore have a bit of a prestige, because not everyone can or should fly them, which for some makes them only more irresistible.