Ships & Modules

I'm looking for a bit of a change of direction.

all my experience so far is in shield tanked boats, usually with missiles, though i have used hybrids on a moa.

apart from training the skills required, what are the important things i should know about armour tanking and using energy weapons?

I have already seen that armor repairers are effective at end of cycle, opposite to shield repairers. when using a shield repairer i usually wait until i am 30% shields- should i start using armour repairer as soon as i start getting damage?

currently, i do pve, whats the best way of tanking for that and should i use a different type of tank as i move in to pvp?

anything else i should know about armour tanking?

energy weapons- i know its mainly em and thermal- anything else i should know beyond hitting F1?

do people carry various crystals to swap over mid fight as situation changes? beam is more long range, pulse short range- anything more i should know about them.

any further advice about energy weapons?

I also understand that amarr ships generally suffer cap issues- how do people generally deal with this? cap boosters?

cheers

I hope you know, that Amarr has also missle boats line. Prophecy -> Armageddon. But they are drone boats, actually. So I do not know how far are you with drones, but if you go into amarr and you missle skills are good you surely can utilise fit like this:

[Armageddon, Armageddon: L4 Geddon]
Large Armor Repairer II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Drone Damage Amplifier II
Centus C-Type Armor EM Hardener
Centus C-Type Armor Thermic Hardener

Sensor Booster II, Targeting Range Script
Large Micro Jump Drive
Omnidirectional Tracking Link II, Optimal Range Script
Omnidirectional Tracking Link II, Optimal Range Script

Cruise Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Cruise Missile
Cruise Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Cruise Missile
Cruise Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Cruise Missile
Cruise Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Cruise Missile
Cruise Missile Launcher II, Mjolnir Cruise Missile
Drone Link Augmentor II
Drone Link Augmentor II

Large Processor Overclocking Unit I
Large Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Large Auxiliary Nano Pump I

Garde II x5
Bouncer II x5

So, no need to rush into energy weapons, if you can use missles and sentry drones. Very effective PVE combination for L4 security missions since you can adapt damage type fully.
As you can notice usual armor tanking for PVE is armoar repairer and two damage hardeners. Hardeners should always be damage specific.

You can start with the missile ships, but to get the most out of the most Amarr ships, you will eventually need lasers.

Pulse lasers are shorter range, better tracking, and higher DPS. Beam lasers are longer range, worse tracking, and lower DPS.

Yes, carry multiple sets of frequency crystals. Know the optimal ranges for each set. Change them out depending on how close your target is.

Scorch crystals are amazing. They have good damage out to beam laser range. Once you have unlocked T2 pulse lasers, you will fit them on most of your ships.

Kind of misleading. Pulse lasers have the worst tracking of short range turrets, while beams have the best tracking of long range turrets. That's kind of important to know, I guess.

obligatory plug for the nightmare. it's a shield tanked laser ship with serious ouch.

They're ugly green turds.

Oh and there's a phallus in there somewhere.

Amarr victor!

Cross training... Not for Ishtar?

Stratios then?

Doing it backwards.

People try amarr then run away from it, not the other way around.

Exception might be cap pilots.

Please keep the thread updated on how it goes for you.

I expect tears.

The nightmare suggestion is a good way to put your toe in the water without getting in too far.

So much dust about to be gathered.

There definitely is a problem with the capacitor.


Omen with full rack of Focused Medium Beam, cap stable @61%
Thorax full rack of 200mm Railgun, cap stable @75%

The Beam have an inherant better trackin than the Railgun, but with the Thorax hull bonus it's pretty much the same, with slightly better damage and pojection for the Thorax.

Same with Harbringer and Brutix.

It is however harder to compare Pulse and Blaster.

Amarr is awesome, since they combine mobility(on most rebalanced hulls), high tracking at medium range, massive dps at medium range and ultra high range(where close range BS hit out out to 100km still with very high dps) and very good armor tanks.

If you have issues with low armor skills you can simply add a 800mm plate to the Omen, I never had issues with the 2008 version of the Omen(that couldn't fit anything decent by the lack of power grid and cpu and only had 5 low slots). The Omen, Navy Omen, Zealot and Legion have one in common, they negate most incoming damage, rather then to tank it. If you use a afterburner and control the range(stay away from ships that can hit hard at close and get close to ships that have tracking issues against them like most BS) you can fly everything up to L4 omni tank(might be a bit harder in the Omen/navy Omen but definitive doable in a Zealot or Legion).

You could give something like this a try, the dps are not that high with low gunnery skills but it should help to get a feel for how to pilot amarr ships. If you get a feel for it and better armor skills(including armor compensations just remove the plate).

[Omen Navy Issue, training weels]
Medium Armor Repairer II
Damage Control II
Adaptive Nano Plating II
800mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Heat Sink II
Heat Sink II
Heat Sink II

Experimental 10MN Afterburner I
Tracking Computer II, Tracking Speed Script
Tracking Computer II, Optimal Range Script

Heavy Modulated Pulse Energy Beam I, Imperial Navy Xray M
Heavy Modulated Pulse Energy Beam I, Imperial Navy Xray M
Heavy Modulated Pulse Energy Beam I, Imperial Navy Xray M
Heavy Modulated Pulse Energy Beam I, Imperial Navy Xray M
Small Tractor Beam I

Medium Energy Locus Coordinator II
Medium Energy Locus Coordinator II
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I

Hobgoblin II x5
Hobgoblin II x5

This setup got like 24 km optimal range with xray, doing over 400 dps at this ranges, if you train up into T2, you can hit with scorch at 52km optimal for the same dps what is amazing for a close range fitted cruiser(a Legion with implants and max skills can deal over 600 at this ranges and over 930 at sub 17km range) and with conflagration good skills and implants a Zealot or Legion can be nearly as devastating at close range than a Deimos or Proteus.

The choice of amarr isn't bad for a caldari speced char, since amarr got also got some good missile options(HAM Legion, Sacrilege, Vengeance) and the they fit very well in to armor fleets where most shield tanked missile ships are a problem. I basically went the other way around and added the caldari skill set to my focused amarr char, given that you need the missile skills as well to fully utilize some hulls. It also grands the ability to fly the NM and have a tool for nearly any L4 application(use a CNR vs Guristas/Angels and Merc, Drones, Blood, Sansha with puls BS like the Navy Apoc, plus they perform a lot better in frig heavy missions than a CM boat).


Here is a bit of a inspiration what can be done with the hulls in level 4 missions:

http://dl.eve-files.com/media/1305/Abaddon_L4_Recon_1.mkv
http://dl.eve-files.com/media/1306/New_NAPOC_Smuggler_Interception.mkv
http://dl.eve-files.com/media/1402/Navy_Apoc_Angel_Extravaganza.mkv