Missions & Complexes

Yeah, room 2 can overwhelm you if you don't prepare for it well enough. When you initially get to room 2, look for the frigates that look like an Atron, they should be called Elite Federation Lixa or Elite Federation Lochos (one appears for each spawn). Shooting at them will trigger the next spawn regardless if you kill the frigate or not, everything else in the spawns are safe to engage and kill without fear of causing a new spawn to show up.

In room three, focus on the Federation Megathrons that you land closest to (3 of them I think at 10Km or less). They will engage you preemptively soon after you land, with or without further provocation. The other two groups, one to the left and another to the right, will ignore you for now. Once the first three battleships are down, you can safely engage the group to the right without getting the group on the left involved. Attacking or moving on the left, I'm pretty sure, will cause the right most to engage you as well, so best leave the left for last. Once you kill the right most group, the three Federation Navy Orions on the left can be (and should be) engaged from range to avoid their large blaster fire. None of the possible frigates in room 3 tackle or use webs, so you can safely ignore them while focusing mainly on the battleships, letting your drones handle the frigs themselves at your leisure.

Besides that, I'd highly recommend taking a look at the link Hasikan Miallok mentioned. Not just for this particular mission, but the remaining ones as well. Mission 4 can be a bit rough in the final room, though not as bad in my opinion as mission 3's second room. Mission 5 can either be rather easy, or very challenging. What tends to make it one or the other relies almost entirely on how much firepower you can bring. You'll be facing Republic Fleet ships (Minmatar Faction) in that mission instead of the Federation Navy ships you've seen in the other missions in Enemies Abound. Thermal damage will work pretty well on most rats in that mission, though the Republic Fleet Darkana's might take a bit to kill as they have 70-80% shield resist for thermal and EM respectively. The spawn waves in that mission are also uniquely time based, set to trigger one after the other in 4 minute intervals, beginning when you actually take the mission's warpgate and land on the other side. This is important to remember, because once you actually enter that mission, the waves will trigger automatically every 4 minutes no matter what else happens, even if you disconnect or have to bail and warp back. Leave for some time and come back, and the one spawn that was there when you first got there will likely be reinforced by several more, and ALL rats in that mission aggro the player the moment you can see them. They won't wait for you to shoot at them or move closer to them. Theoretically, you could ignore them and go straight for the Smuggler's Gate, but I wouldn't recommend that strategy as it will take some time to destroy even with good offense, and likely not before at least two or more additional spawn waves arrive.

Note that each spawn wave is signified by a message in red letters that will appear in local (not by a player, obviously, but it will show up like any other player message) aproximately 10 seconds before that wave shows up, and the same message will repeat for each wave thereafter, good indicator that more targets are on their way. If you have to, for any reason, leave the mission for longer than a minute or two, I'd actually strongly encourage you to play it safe and cancel the mission. That mission has on hand one of the highest volumes of enemy DPS for L4 missions in one room if all waves are permitted to spawn unopposed (around 3000 total from all waves last I checked) and that DPS is touches all four damage types. Loosing some standings and some fifty mill in loot and tags is better than loosing a mission fit battleship. If you can, however, kill rats fast enough and maintain a solid pace, it can feel like a breeze. It will not forgive you if bring too little firepower, and even a Marauder can struggle if the pilot is unprepared for it.

Sorry for the giving you a lot to read, but I can still remember a time for me when these missions could be at times dangerously uneasy and knowing how each one worked is what made them safe to run.

You can keep the AB fitted to get to gates quickly and keep at the snipe distance when needed.


This is a cheap fit I use for L4s and it works fine. Even more tank then needed, but I like to have a buffer just in case I run into PvP.

[Scorpion Navy Issue, SNI-PvE snipe (140km range)]
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Co-Processor II
Damage Control II

Heavy F-RX Prototype Capacitor Boost
X-Large Shield Booster II
Target Painter II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Sensor Booster II
Large Micro Jump Drive
Shield Boost Amplifier II
500MN Cold-Gas Enduring Microwarpdrive

Cruise Missile Launcher II
Cruise Missile Launcher II
Cruise Missile Launcher II
Cruise Missile Launcher II
Cruise Missile Launcher II
Cruise Missile Launcher II

Large Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer II
Large Anti-Kinetic Screen Reinforcer II
Large Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer II


Hobgoblin II x3
Gecko x1
Hammerhead II x1

Cap Booster 800 x15
Caldari Navy Scourge Cruise Missile x1672

That example fit is a lazy sniper fit (not focussed on dps). With T2 missles I lack range and can't snipe from 140km away, hence the faction missles. I have resistance rigs fitted to have an omni resistance going on, needing me to put only one invul shield on a mid slot to have decent resistance on all 4 types (so no refitting between misions)... leaving me with 7 more mid slots to do whatever with. In genreal the SNI is a bit OP for L4 missions, it can active tank +2000 dps easily if needed :P

heh you posted while I did :P

So you know some missions can put out 3k dp?. A proper fitted sni can perma tank it, but it requires a cap stable 2*large pith booster set up. I made one once for someone. replace yr senser booster with a em amplifer and yr invul field gives you all the resists you need with a decent tank, thanks to the native bonuses of the sni hull. If you tried it you would thank me btw, cos warp speed rigs are amazing.

I think we all see hes not using the MGCs, or the rigor/flare rig set up that would really help his play style. Thank you for the kinetic tip though. I knew from eve survival that the sansha tyrants were ripping me to shreads with EM at 50km, but I just never followed that train of thought home. I love this community and how I can still learn from you guys after all these years of following you :)

The second stage of Assault and Damsel in Distress are two that come to mind if you hit all the triggers. Possibly the second room on Enemies 3/5 and Enemies 5/5 if you start it and let the successive waves spawn (fun, but not recommended).