Ships & Modules

You should be able to solo... actually solo... C2 sites in a number of less expensive ships. Tengu will do fine. Also, with the mobile depot you should be able to do it with one character, one ship, two fits.

One more thing: don't bring the crystal clone. Bubbles happen in W space

Oh My Lord, 2 actually constructive comments! I didn't think it was possible! Thank you both for the advice, especially after my 3am ramblings.

A couple of things, what did you both think of the fit i posted? If i go HML's i lose about 35% of my DPS.
The crystal set is low grade and the Omega isn't actually implemented yet so I'm ok with the risk.

The mobile depot method, sounds good but isnt this a big 'come shoot me' sign on your head? I dont understand it fully as i've never run it before. So i fit my Tengu for cargo hold, bring everything i may ever need with me including the depot, i anchor the depot and put everything inside, changing my fit for damage. go do my business then come back and refitt for salvage?

Is there some sort of force field around it? you said if i get caught at it to just refit then fly away, is this even possible?

What should a lower skilled char thats joining me bring? He can fly a drake for damage or would he best be utilised in a dedicated cloaky salvage ship to speed up the method? I'll have an alt scanning and scouting all the sites and wh's so he wont be needed doing that.

J

First and foremost it would help to understand the nature of your site running.

For example, many moons ago I would solo C3 sites in a Tengu. But i was living in the C3 at the time so my fit was based around the fact that I had a safe POS to warp back to (no need for cloak or probes).

That can be different from running sites in a system you don't live in.

Knowing which can help. I am guessing from your comments however you are looking at the latter.

If you want to go truly solo, it can be done, but I would definitely go the mobile depot route.

I would splurge on the "yurt" mobile depot as it is very very (very) hard to scan down. Bring a mobile depot, refit mods (yay refitting subs in space") with a cloaky scan fit as well as combat fit.

Honestly your fit is crap. Go with HML. The key benefit of the Tengu is range. C2-C4 can have spawns at a fair distance and you will be wasting lots of time burning into range. Yes you may lose a little DPS, but being able to apply immediately vs burning at a wave that spawned 90km away to get into range makes up for it. It also allows you to stay off the warp in beacon as well as distance for warpable wrecks (for safety). Drop the cloak. You can refit a cloak quickly if needed. By the same token if you are running C2 sites you can warp back to the HS WH and just bug out.

absolutely leave your crystal set at home. Most of the time if you get caught, a gank squad will get a hic to get your pod, even if they have to wait a minute to go get one. Running solo you will die eventually and you will likely lose your pod.

You talk about running the sites but how about making isk? The majority of C2 site value is from melted nanoribbons, more than the blue tags. Which means you need to salvage the wrecks after to make it even close to worth running.

If I were going to go truly solo I would do the following.

I would make 2 fits. One would be a scanning/salvaging fit (the scanning fit also has the bonuses for tractor beams). Depending on space you could also make it covert. Or just use a non covert cloak.

I would first make some good safe spots. I would drop my Yurt mobile depot at a safe and swap to my combat fit. I'm pretty sure you need a max prober to scan down a yurt depot (I never could on any of my scanners on the test server).

Go run sites. Refit for salvaging and get the isk.

If you get jumped you should be able to warp to your depot, quickly slap on a cloak, scoop it all and gtfo before you get probed and tackled.

Having a scan alt definitely helps as it negates the concern of carrying probes etc in case you lose your WH connection out.

The extra range does a lot more for you than just save time in a site. Rats in C2 & C3 sites can web/neut out past 60km, some past 100km and lots of the frigs will scrams you.

I usually just run whatever BC I find the most amusing with a general T2 tank/ship DPS fit with some salvage drones and a probe bay in a high slot (Edit: for C2 PvE, obviously). I tend to prefer Amarr just because lasers are pretty, but I've used a Drake in the past and I imagine the others are fine.

I wouldn't bother with T3 or in-space refitting unless you're actually planning to hang out in w-space long-term and are doing C3+. Unless you're intentionally trying to start PvP, in which case you've selected a pretty efficient method for that.

No heavy neuts in C2's sorry.

@OP you ARE going to get killed eventally (not necessarily "ganked" just killed). This is part of -1.0 life.
The only thing that can do is mitigate the loss with the income or by making it tough to do so whilst still shooting sleepers.
For C2's a T2 fit Cerberus will have you at great range whilst maintaining high speed which makes you harder to tackle.
Keep your pod cheap as most WH groups bring dic/hictors.

Most important KNOW WHAT EVERY SINGLE SIG IS IN THAT SYSTEM! If you know where they are coming from then you can have passive alts on connecting wormholes with the volume up so you can hear jumps. Watch out for new sigs appearing and keep an eye on dscan because the people with a pos in that WH you are ratting tend to take offence at you removing their income.

Having said this if you are specifically looking at C2's then bear in mind that most C2 corps make isk from a combo of farming their static and PI and most of their own sites are left as bait so that guys like you do what you are suggesting and they get a quick juicy kill at relatively low risk.