EVE General Discussion

I have been running level 4s with my Tengu for some time now, and they have always gone very smoothly. No warping out, good DPS, can orbit a wreck for most of the mission, and can run from the computer if needed. Against Guristas, the DPS is also very nice.

However, I was looking at using an alt to assist, instead of just salvage at the end. I figured that since I have an alt with decent drone skills, I would try semi-afking a drone ship, since I have seen many people mention it. (and since they are solo, I figured that this would work out perfectly with two characters.)

So I fit out a Dominix, took "The Assault," and flew my Tengu and Dominix out there. Tengu goes it first, and starts agroing the stuff, and the Dominix comes in about 30 seconds later. Most of the NPCs are about 40km off, and some out around 100km, so I toss out my Gardes. Since I dont have anything on me, I have to tell the Gardes who to target, and that is fine, because I have two monitors, and it took minimal time. Getting ECMed was a pain, but still. The problem was that about 15 seconds after the Gardes started shooting, half the ships decided that my space potato looked mighty tasty, and completely switched to me. I got my LARs going, and noticed that I had two Gardes taking damage. Scoop them up, wait 5 seconds, poop them back out. By this time, almost all the ships have switched to my Dominix, even though my Tengu is putting out more DPS, and is closer.

So I scoop up the Gardes again, and Micro Jump. This puts them about 120km away, which was farther than my 104km targeting range. No big deal, start floating him over while you mess around with the Tengu. Too bad that nearly all those ships were still on my Dominix, and pounding him with cruise missiles, even at 120km. (And I read SO many places that a heavy tank wouldnt be needed, because you just jump and range tank... Yeah...) So I get into targeting range, and drop the Bouncers. They dont get agro, but I have to scoop them and warp out because the damage was easily overpowering my Core A-type LAR. The Tengu now gets all the agro again, and spend the rest of the time at 100% shields, orbiting his wreck.

Once I get some cap back, I warp the Dominix back in, drop the Gardes, and about 15 seconds later I get agro again, some even to the drones. (this is post wave spawn, btw. Just random agro switches) Again, the Dominix is farther away, doing less DPS, and yet the whole room really likes the way he smells. Scoop, MJD, Bouncers, blah. Same results, but this time the room clears before I run out of cap on the Dominix. Tengu still orbiting his wreck, still at 100% shields.

Repeat for pocket two, including very sporadic agro changes towards my drones. Good thing that this was a "drop drones at 100km and make yourself a sandwich" ship, being that I spent almost all my time and attention babysitting it, while the Tengu actually worked semi afk for the most part. Just pick new targets, and start shooting after reloading for the most part.

So seriously, wtf? Why does everyone say that the Dominix is a great AFK ship? I should have just spent the extra time, got a second Tengu, and flown those two... Likely would have been nearly as fast, no slow boating BS, no warping out, no drone micromanagement, no crazy agro swaps (which I was assured wouldnt happen, being that agro was already taken...) etc. I did "The Score" as well, with very similar results. Even worse, I was so busy micromanaging the crap, that I MJDed and forgot to stop ship, and when my Bouncers got agro, I was 17km off...

TL;DR:

The Dominix is far from a semi-AFK ship, and I dont get why people suggest it as such. Especially not as a second ship for mission running...

Um... If anything, it should be in ships, but I think general discussion is a good place for a "why do people suggest X for Y" thread...

For the linky challenged: --> Missions & Complexes

This is not quite right.

I have the same set up for doing exploration sites. I use an Ishtar though. The exact same thing happens. It seems that the aggro mechanics are weighted more heavily vs drone ships. I have done this when warping in multiple cruiser hulls at the same time after the Tengu, the Ishtar's always get the aggro not other stuff. You can pull in the drones and just sit there soaking up damage and doing no DPS from the Ishtar and aggro still does not shift to the Tengu.

Something is clearly wrong. I have not bothered to bug report it since the response would be something along the lines of yours, "the poster is ignorant of mechanics and is just whining."

Does that fix the aggro issue? Because the ops complaint as i understand it is that he would ha e less micromanaging sentry aggro if he just flew 2 tengus. Easier to managing. No scooping and wapring around = more dps = faster mission completion and less stress.

Found your problem...

Forget tengu get 2 RR domis. Drones will get aggroed as you said. Shouldn't be a problem though. Afking is a thing of the past.

the domi IS suited to go against guristas. BUT the mjd is supposed to get enogh r ange so u dont get any damage from npc ships or very reduced. and against guristas this is simply not the case. WHICH WHY u simply dont use mjd against guristas

I've tried a MJD Domi in The Assault. It was pretty obvious quite quickly in the first room that it was not going to do well. Grabbed my Tengu, and cleaned up the rest of the mission.

Maybe it's because my skills with the Tengu are a lot better, but that one mission in particular is a challenge with it for me. There are a few though that the Domi does just beautiful on.

End result, it's likely that there is no one-ship-fits-all for missions. Just like ammo, you need to choose your ship.

1. No mission ship is an AFK ship since 2 expansions ago.
2. Domi and Tengu are great combo but no need to MJD domi for that setup. You orbit the Domi with the Tengu and assist the Tengu with the drones.
3. You have to manage the agro on the assault unless you want 2500 DPS on you.

That's probably one of the most fun tandem builds I've run, and very easy to manage even without ISBoxer. You are making it harder than it has to be with bad agro and the MJD.