Ships & Modules

Hi all,

I've been an indy player since I started Eve, but am considering branching out. I have a friend who would like to do some exploration and complexes either in low sec or wormholes, and am considering buying a character to play with him. We'd also like to get involved in a little PVP from time to time.

I am pretty sure that I want a T3 cruiser. Before I did much reading I thought that I wanted a Loki. I like the Minmatar style, and thought that the Loki would be a fun ship to fly. Since reading though it seems that most explorers favor the Tengu. Can anyone tell me what advantages one brings over the other? Are any of the other two T3 cruisers a good choice for what I want to do? I don't know anything about the Legion, but my friend is going to fly a Proteus almost for sure.

Thanks in advance. Any insight is appreciated!

For exploration it really depends on WHICH NPC rat type you are going against. For WH's, i can give you the run down as i've lived in WH for 2 years now and have flown all 4 T3's extensively.

Tengu: By far and wide the best choice for WH's. A 1 bil fit will let you push around 400-500 DPS while tanking around 900 DPS. Heavies fly far so you can hit practically everything on field. If you "hero-Tank" it, you can get insane tank numbers, but for an insane price tag. My personal Tengu costs over 2 bil (reasonable for a deadspace tengu) but it pushes 680 DPS, tanks 660 DPS, and hits anything out to 114km.

Legion: Second best choice. Legions loaded with scorch and a decent AB can hit things on field fairly well. If you are under heavy webs it'll be harder, but it's a fair trade for (almost) never needing to replenish your ammo. (i go through about 200k Trauma in my tengu every month). You can field a very strong tank on a legion and it has one area will it will almost always out-pace a Tengu, and that's killing frigates. When we run fleets we usually have atleast 1 legion purely for "frig-duty".

Loki: Third option. You can get a decent tank on it for a reasonable price, but your range is very limited. You will spend alot of time simply flying to get in range of your targets, and you will use ALOT of ammo (talking about AC fit, Arty fits are ok but your applied DPS will be lower). The lack of a sub that boosts shield boost amount means your strong tank comes from resists. Invul's cost a good chunk of isk for deadspace or faction compared to the cheaper shield boosters you could use on a Tengu.

Proteus: Honestly, if you are flying a proteus in a WH, it should be because you are hunting somebody. Rarely ever used for PVE and for good reason, your range with blasters is laughable, and with rails you will only scratch the sleepers. For PVP however, the Proteus is a Demon in WH's. It is the only cloaky vessel outside of a bomber which can push over 500 DPS, and with blasters (unlike torps) you can obliterate small vessels just as east as large ones.

Windorian's listing makes full sense, just emphasising that a tengu is only on top if you do sleepers because of their omni tank and damage. Would you be doing exploration or missions then it really depends on what faction space you're in and thus which npcs you get to tank/shoot. For instance, using a tengu in Amarr space for exploration would be utter crap.

Sad fact: you're wrong. Tengu wins against Guristas/Serpentis hands down. Angels are weak enough to kinetic that you can still use your bonus there. Against Blood/Sansha you have to forego the kinetic damage bonus -- but due to the Tengu's insane ability to apply damage at range it's still the best T3 for low sec exploration and can hold its own in null.

Yes I'm serious, yes I've tried it, yes I've tried the alternatives: Tengu is still the best solo exploration platform against Blood/Sansha.

Lots of great info here. I appreciate all of the responses. It pretty much confirmed that I'll be flying a Tengu when we get into WH exploration. My friend is much too far along in his Proteus training to turn back now. Are there any things that we can do to make the duo more viable for Sleeper sites? I know that remote rep groups are fairly popular, but I'm guessing that he'll be armor tanking and I'll be shield tanking. Is there anything else that might be worth knowing before making the jump and purchasing a character?