Missions & Complexes

Rapid heavies will usually outperform cruise missiles if they're utilized properly. They take out ships faster so you lose less DPS to NPC repairs. They're particularly effective (without rigors or flares) against frigates and cruisers.

I'd say it is more like most pve pilots are lazy and have no mind for efficiency. by fitting for low dps they MUST then use remaining slots for tank.

when used right brawler boats need the least tank as they kill the rats very quickly. A blaster kronos or vindy in something like damsel is just funny.

In general kiting has plenty of problems in its own. with Turrets that means doing less dps. With missiles it means doing less dps as defnders can catch missiles more easily, and you will waste volleys unless you pay way too much attention volley counting. although on a paladin it works pretty well thanks to the insane range with multi. I will admit I have arty on my mach, but I only use it for missions where I need to hit a few targets at various ranges and the mach's mobility is the most important factor. For most missions I would probably fly with ACs, and mainly had an AC mach for a long time.

once you can do over 1k dps with reasonable projection tank is pretty irrelevant. most of my ships have a lazy omnitank as I cba to switch it between missions, and I don't have any resist holes for gankers to go after.

But about a 3rd of the time they're reloading (50 seconds dps, then 35 seconds reload) so the slightly increased base dps (even with better application) doesn't make it worth it, not even slightly. Besides, heavies still suck vs frigates anyway, that's what your drones are for. With 2 rigor/1 flare you can get cruise apply enough damage so that cruiser get hit just fine.

The only way to get more dps out of them is if you go heavy fury, but then you still have to account for reloading which brings overall dps back to cruise level but with the added annoyance of a lack of range and of course reloading every so often.

For lvl 3 rapid heavy raven makes sense, for lvl 4 it doesn't (exceptions always exist depending on mission of course).

This thread has been moved to Missions & Complexes.

You can use precision cruise missiles for the cruisers and keep applying drones to frigs and/or cruisers while you don't have to stop shooting.
Rapids are good for pvp when you need high damage for a shortish time. In pve you need constant damage over longish time

You don't need missiles to deal with frigs/cruisers in rattle. Sentries with two omni's takes care of them in few volleys in (15-100km range) while you shoot BS'es with your cruises.

Raven -> Navy Raven -> Tengu -> Golem

Get basic skills for the raven or navy raven if you can afford it and start working towards that tengu, the answer to almost every eve "what should i fly?" question is the tengu.

If you can fly all 3 plus a fast mwd frig you can easily make over 120m isk an hour blitzing l4 missions. Each mission requires a different ship for maximum efficiency.

Rattlesnake is a fine choice too, though i wasn't overly impressed with it when compared to a tengu. just found it to be a lot of extra training out of the way for not really any benefits

It's always a magazine btw.

Raven.

Read this: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=411035

LMJD Raven with Auto Targeting missiles is pretty easy to fit and to fly. You will be doing l4 like a pro in no time.

My advice would be to avoid drone boats