Ships & Modules

Just to underscore the point - you are doing it wrong.

I fly a Navy Domi which is fitted for drones (as my gunnery skills are a joke). It basically amounts to a sphere of death with 108 km radius - 2 sets of sentries (gardes and either bouncers or wardens depending on damage type needed) and one set of heavies (berserkers - only some of the Matar ships are big enough and get close enough to justify using them over sentries) along with one set of light drones (you gotta love the 400 m3 drone bay of the Navy Domi) and you are setup for success.

The immobility of the sentries is basically inconsequential when you can "reach out and touch" basically anything in the pocket where you land (with very very few exceptions).

There are only two times when you are going to use heavies over sentries:

1) When you get some of the faster matar battleships orbiting up close (usually this is the named mission guys - general battleships are not really an issue for sentries) -> Berserkers
2) When you have an annoying mission where you have to burn a fair distance to a gate - then you let heavies do the work while you burn to the gate.

Never mind my fitting request. EFT ftw.^^

*EDIT*
The lack of mobility is a huge contra I still see in sentries. Missions like Dread Pirate Scarlet, Worlds Collide, The Assault, Silence the Informant ect. require some kiilometers to move. And that could end up in a leathal way if the DPS gets too high.

Amazingly it takes almost no time to switch out drones depending on missions. As I said above I will still use heavies in missions that require significant movement.

The converse however is that there are 2 specific times (maybe more, but these are 2 times i can think of on the top of my head) where the immobility of sentries is an asset.

1. Missions that require no movement. If memory serves, I had far more LVL 4 missions that require no movement than do. And a number of the missions that require movement I would skip anyhow, as I would have to refit for a prop mod as well (lazy).

2. Missions where drone proximity is an aggro trigger. Again, as I mentioned above I haven't run missions in months. But i do recall a number of missions where your drones will aggro additional groups if they get to close. Also many times those missions the aggro will be on the drones. Nothing worse than sending out your drones 30km away to kill group 1, only to have group 2 aggro your drones. Now you either have to let them die, or waste time recalling and re-deploying. Sentries in this case can reach out and kill without getting in proximity aggro range.

Bottom line, if you are a serious drone pilot you will want/need both. But even then I use sentries far more than heavies. Probably at least 80/20.

Also, yes t1 sentries stink. Hence the reason i used faction while I trained for T2. Well worth the investment (which I got back when i sold them).

Keep tanking those L4s to death. Eventually you will, in fact, complete them....

Or to drop the attitude, yes, this is a valid use for a Rattlesnake. It has a silly tank and if afking missions is your thing, it can take full advantage of that to very slowly coast through any mission you throw at it. Unfortunately, it isn't a very ganky boat nomatter what you do with it, so go ahead and skip the sentries on it. However, sentries will always make more sense if you're going for a ganky fit -- such as a shield tanked nDomi. Their ability to start applying damage instantly would make up for travel time on heavies under these conditions even without the SDA II you really ought to be slapping on there.



70% increase. Not quite a doubling. But yeah, it would help.

Sure, which is why i said already, for the missions that make sense I will pull out a set of sentries and replace with heavies. That's the nice thing about drone boats. It's not a ship refit, just drag out one type, put in another.

And you keep talking Gardes. Yes Gardes have the shortest range. With my skills and 2 omni's wardens have an optimal of 110km as an example. I don't have to move to get my sentries into optimal. I always pack gardes (best close up tracking) and mission specific sentries, depending on range and optimal damage type.

For hardcore movement missions, swap omni's for navis and swap to heavies. I don't have to choose one or the other exclusively.



If you are using a Rattler, you aren't going for max speed anyhow. It is known as an amazing AFK ship (in which case heavies are easier to afk) but not for ultimate gank speed.

With the exception of high movement missions, I'd put my rail fit, 2x sentry rig (20% extra damage) sentry domi up against your Rattler anyday.

Either way. The main point is, drone boats you have the flexibility to use all kinds of cool drones. I use every drone option I can. But in general I use Sentries more.