Ships & Modules

Exploration frigs don't have much tank (or any tank really aside from the astero) so chances are if someone can lock you up you will have seconds before your ship pops. This will usually not be enough time for your alt to decloak and lock up your aggressor.

That said, doing exploration in wormholes or null the ships you usually need to worry about are cloakies: stealth bombers, asteros', stratioses and t3 cruisers. Torpedo fit SBs will not apply damage very well to a frigate sized target and are pretty helpless if you can get a lock on them so you might have a chance against them, an astero will eat them up. The astero is a tough little nut and can eat up exploration frigs no problem. Usually they are active tanked in my experience so nuets will shut their tank down. The stratios and t3 cruisers will be tougher. Most hunting Stratioses I see are buffer fit with energy neutralizers in the highs, they are fairly beefy and can dish out impressive damage using drones. The key here would be to out DPS and out tank them, so a t3 cruiser might be the best option. T3 cruisers would be the top of the cloaky food chain, usually you'll have a brick tanked Proteus or Tengu on you, for these your best option would be to jam them and book it with everyone's favourite cloaky ECM ship the falcon. If you want to bring the fight to them you could try a pilgrim, as cap is often the weak point on a t3. Occasionally you will run into a cloaky smartbombing proteus, against these there is no defence as far as I know, when you notice them decloaking your ship will already be gone.

So I guess if you want to try having an alt watch over you while you explore you might want to go for a Stratios, a Pilgrim a Falcon or a t3 cruiser BUT imo the best defence as an explorer is agility and the ability to align and gtfo the second you see something fishy. Engaging them in a fight could cost you big if they have friends.

Thanks for the feedback. I'd thought of a falcon, but it seemed designed for GTFO whereas I was trying to think of a way of surprising the ganker. Astero bait might work against a SB or another Astero, but I guess not against a bigger predator like a Sratios or T3.

Also:
The trouble with the "lone ganker" is.... he usually ain't alone. Unless you have a scout in neighboring systems, you never know if the cavalry is waiting on the other side of a gate.

Leviathan, fit a cloak.