Missions & Complexes

Why not a Rattlesnake? Marauder seems a bit overkill to be honest, unless you want to salvage on the go so to speak

If you show me a T1 BS able to deal 800 DPS @85km / 1400 DPS @ 35km, able to salvage on the go, I'm ok to say that the only thing a Marauder has that's better than a T1 BS is the tank. Good luck.

You are aware that bastion module gives you 1 min aggression timer preventing docking / jumping?

I would suggest going for vindicator or Marachiel instead. Especially the Mach is quite popular mission-running ship for a reason. Plus the increased agility and warp speed make dragging it with you in your travels a lot less painful.

Yeah faction stuff is technically T1, but talking about T1 often refer as regular T1 hull. That's why everybody call this pimpy T1 "faction" and not "T1 faction" or "T1 pirate" or whatever. Anyway even the mighty Rattlesnake can't reach the mentioned applied DPS with salvaging capabilities. Yes, Machariel and Rattlesnake are PvE monsters, but Marauders still a bit better, for not-that-much more skill. Also, this timer isn't that much of an issue, assuming that you can switch the bastion off a bit before the end of the mission. Eventually this is irrelevant as the main topic was about comparing Kronos and Vargur.

Mhm. As far as salvaging goes Rattle can salvage if you need to. Either by drones or by dedicating it's spare slot to it and using MTU. While it wont be applying it's full dps to everyting on grid neither will Marauders. Rattle can push quite impressive on-paper dps number above what is aciveable on most Marauders without having to lock itself in place for a minute for acieving that.

TBH I would rather not salvage in your combat ship in the first place. Either throw it at Pro Synergy or bring an alt in a proper ship for it.

I can fly all Marauders but only one I'm occasionally using is painter Golem with remote senor boosters and acting as drone trigger (when multiaccounting small swarm of alts). Most of the time I'm pulling better speeds with mix of navy / pirate BS hulls.

The main problem with pirate BS's is that you really want to have full set of lev 5's to make them tick properly most of the time I remember, for example, when I first started with Nighghtmare with BS skills at 5 and turret supports at 4. I could not understand what was so awesome about it. When I used it again at some latter date with all turret support skills at 5 then it was quite different beast all the sudden. So while one can wiggle into the pirate BS hull earlier SP wise with low SP, in my opinion, Marauder might actually make little more sense, Sure the AWU 5 is obstacle but it takes much less SP than getting pirate BS to really shine.

If the OP is considering Vargur or Kronos then I, in turn, would suggest taking a good look at Marachiel instead. Especially the added warp speed can be significant if he is into blitzing.

Yes it does.

If the target is a BC or BS and not moving that fast. Which is a good amount of targets

We are getting a bit off topic I think in here.

As far as Rattlesnake goes, you use Sentries to blap frigs on approach, same as any turret BS does and use launchers on targets where they apply their damage best. If something gets near you you have an option to either wear it down with missiles or put a Gecko / lights on it - depends on your setup what makes sense (i.e., number of painters vs number of drone dracking mods and/or even drone speed mods). It is more or less same as with navy phoon - navy phoon just gets a little more oomph out of its launchers and a little less from drones.

A sentry Rattlesnake is very similar to a Marauder in it's usage as for "proper application" of damage it's stationary because of sentries. It does have an option to travel (usually using gecko or heavies) but travel time can waste a lot of that "on paper" dps - can be optimized ofc if you pick targets manually for your flying drones to minimize flight time but even so.

TBH I'm not an expert on how a solo rattle flies in PvE as I use almost always more than one account for whatever I am doing. From multiaccounting perspective Rattle damage application takes substantial micromanagement if you want to drag every last percentage out of it.

One more aspect in this Marauder vs T1 (when counting faction / pirate into T1) is the number of rig slots. At some point when you do missions fast enough the warp speed rig starts to make sense. Marauders have only 2 rig slots while T1 have three. If the low slot warp speed mods have dropped enough in price by now then dunno - perhaps one might give up one lowslot instead of rig slot for warp speed. All my mission-running BS are T2 warp speed rigged.

Challenge accepted.

In EFT, with All V character, 1 torp 5% implant, no drones, no boosters, no links, no fleet:

[Raven, Raven torp]
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
[empty low slot]

[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]

Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
[empty high slot]

[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]

DPS: 1321
Volley: 7286

=========

[Raven Navy Issue, Navy Torp]
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
[empty low slot]

[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]

Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo

[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]

DPS: 1321
Volley: 9715

=========

[Golem, Golem Torp]
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System

[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]
[empty med slot]

Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Mjolnir Rage Torpedo
[empty high slot]
[empty high slot]
[empty high slot]
[empty high slot]

[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]

DPS: 1321
Volley: 9715

=================

Note the pattern of damage output. If I included defensive stats, you'd see a dramatic increase from T1 through Marauder. I assume you specify the range plus dps numbers to account for rage vs javelin and/or cruise vs torp. The damage output pattern between hulls is the same. I can get 946 DPS and 5992/9715 volley with t2 cruise and can engage at 150km or further on all three hulls (w/out implants, boosters, etc). Throw in a mobile tractor to account for the marauder tractors. Feel free to import it directly into EFT for yourself.


A person who actually does his homework, rather than mindlessly parroting the meta presented in public forums by people with a vested interest in selling expensive ships to stupid people.

Weak. Be a good sport and admit that you didn't know what you were talking about.

Torp damage application might make some small difference in an L4 against frigs and cruisers. But if you're fighting at 30km or less in an L4, any time you're saving with high DPS, you're losing manuevering to get into range and travel in the pocket. At that range, you might need a marauder's tank if you're popping all the triggers in the high end missions, but for most of the missions you will be hilarousily over tanked.

A raven with t2 precision cruise missiles, a painter, guided missile implant, and rigors pops frigs in a single volley and cruisers in one or two (depending on type; note thats horde/sanctum rats, so they may be tougher). A well skilled pilot could do it with precision and any one of those bonuses. A marauder does no better and all of its tank is wasted at those ranges (at 100+ a raven rarely gets past half shields).

I restate: for L4s a marauder is a waste. It is no better than a raven or navy raven. In a horde or sanctum, a torp marauder is excellent. The marauder's niche is high end pve content in which the intial dps must be tanked long enough to get past the tipping point.

You did not address the most important part of what he said. I highlighted it for you.