Ships & Modules

No. Especially not once you get heavy missile specialization to 4 and start using the T2 high damage heavies.

That's not the whole story. Faction launchers have two things going for them: rate of fire and clip capacity. The latter is marginally useful (44 vs. 40 volleys before reload iirc), but the former is the real kicker. CN/DG launchers will always have a better rate of fire than T2 launchers, even at spec 5 (note that this is in contrast to guns, where T2 guns roughly match faction guns' damage mods at spec 3 and pass them at spec 4 and further note that gun specialization skills increase damage mod while missile spec skills improve rate of fire).

To match the damage output of faction launchers, T2 launchers must use Fury/Rage missiles. For the sake of simplicity we'll focus on guided missiles; it's a bad idea to use unguided missiles without an option to throw in Javelin anyhow.

For examples, we'll use a not-atypical mission Nighthawk with max skills, 4 CN BCUs, and a T2 BLA. T2 launchers with Scourge Fury give 600 DPS; 587 at spec 4. The same fitting with CN launchers and CN Scourge throws out 555 DPS.

Now, obviously the NH has a bonus to hitting smaller targets, but even then it's rarely a good idea to fire Fury at frigates. Precision is still awful, so that leaves options of T1 missiles or the same CN missiles we're already using with the CN launchers. Dropping to CN Scourge gives 537 DPS at max skills; 526 at spec 4. Now the CN launchers are definitely performing better -- plus they didn't have to wait 10 seconds to reload.

So it does depend. CN launchers will do more damage to smaller targets. With T2 launchers you face the options of either doing less damage to all targets or more to larger and less to smaller while suffering additional reload time on the ammo switch.

Whether CN launchers are thus "worth it" is up to you, but they certainly present very real advantages.

Precision missiles work just fine 2 shot most webifiers and 3 maybe 4 shot spiders once they reduce speed.

imo the cost does not justify the gain. And you can still put navy ammo in your T2 launchers and get the RoF bonus from the spec skill.

The T2 give you more dmg and furies are utilized pretty well by Tengus and NHs, the natural "pinnacle" ships for PvE players still interested in HMLs.

You can always switch to CN ammo to clear the pesky lil elite frigs at the start of missions / mission rooms / new spawns etc. Most of the times you do save more than 3-4 volleys against frigs switching to CN from furies (even with full flare/rigor rigs), and with furies you do save WAY more than 10 sec.

I am not even mentioning the price difference for using exclusively faction ammo, and since (unlike the turret situation and the old T2 ammo/Faction ammo balance) T2 missiles do improve your performance, makes no sense if you have the skills and the fitting to use T2 launchers, not to do so.

Doesn't take long to get T2 missiles 2 weeks max.

The damage difference is fairly significant tje ability to use any missile priceless



I could not imagine running a Golem without Javelin Juggers. The short range torps you are going to find yourself unable to finish some missions you can hardly even catch some jump gates with a Golem much less a rat BS.

I didn;t reach 60km with Golem until I had T2 and all flight skills to V. Plus inplants. Maybe it is who you are running missions for though not sure.

Tengus changed the mission running scheme...it's so fast to spec up to 95% of the performance of a perfect V tengu in missions, it's scary. We are talking less than 2 months for a player that has already T2 HMLs and half decent missile support skills (lvl 4s). A very focused mission running toon can do a nearly perfect Tengu starting from scratch in what? Few months? Never done it, so I don't know exactly - play with it in EVEmon if you wish...but please, that's ridiculous fast.

I know skill training is frustrating for most new players.
I know that I'm far from being the oldest dinosaur in the EVE uni, but I've known since year 1 that specializing into something is NOT that bad, unless you are talking perfect V chars, or perfect V Golems and carriers etc...having not to invest the first months of your "life" in eve into learning skills is also a huge thing.

Now, if you are a noob pilot, 5-6 months old and already planning into your Golems and Tengus etc with a gazilion of other things trained here and there, well, you are rushing yourself. Also the OP was about HML, so plz, we are talking 2 weeks or so to go into T2 missiles. If you have the isk to buy the CN launchers and then re-sell them, with profit or slight loss, by all means do it...not a big deal.

If you want to push the conversation into specing for a Golem, a totally different animal, you are right...to get the full benefits of the ship you need to invest A LOT of time into missile support skills...way more than Torp Spec etc. Similarly (to a lower extend tho) for the CNR.

Not if you use rage which I do.

The only reason to use Faction ammo is in some specific situations: assault ships with very small sign radius and drones.

Everything else, T2 ammo = more dps (you need max support skills and spec at least IV, implants are a +)