MyFirstRattingBS.com

[slog]

Hi,

I've decided that I need to be able to Rat in a BS before I keep building up my PvP skills.  I'm Caldari.

I have two questions:

1) What are the minimum skills I need to be able to Rat SOLO in the Caldari BS?
2) With said minimum skills, what would I be looking at for fittings?


Thanks!

[Sparky]

Step 1: Use a drake

Not being snarky a drake should be fine and much easier on the wallet plus less risk.

[tazelbain]

http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=12331.msg412204#msg412204

Ya, setup a drake 1)  you'll need drake to get the cash for your raven and 2) upgrading to raven is basicly 2 more skills after that.

One thing to remember is that: if you have a ship build, you can look the items up in Evemon and tell it add the minimum skills need to use it to your plan.

[Murgos]

I was able to Rat in providence in a Myrmidon.  I observed others ratting in Drakes.  I don't know about triple BS spawns in -1.0 systems but million isk bounty ships in providence went down pretty easy to hob II's and some railgun fire.

It was faster to rat in a BS once I made that jump (due to much increased DPS) but not really necessary.

[slog]

I have a Drake.  It's not working out for Solo.  Works fine for Ratting with someone though.


Edit:  The spots were I can "safely" Rat are all full of Angels BS spawns.    I've also looked at the Loadouts on evemon, but I didn't see one that really tells me what the minimum is the Rat Angels Solo.

[IainC]

Step 1: Use a drake

Not being snarky a drake should be fine and much easier on the wallet plus less risk.

This is good advice.

A drake will pwn most belt rats just fine even with low skills. A Raven with low skills is an expensive liability.

Skills you will need, Get these as high as you can. Level 4 is sufficient but you will want them at 5 eventually:

Fitting skills (these skills make it easier for you to fit stuff):
Electronics
Engineering
Weapons Upgrades
Hull Upgrades
Energy Grid Upgrades
Energy Management
Energy Systems Operation

Tanking Skills:
Shield Upgrades
Shield Operation
Tactical Shield Manipulation
Shield Management
Thermic/Kinetic/EM/Explosive Shield Compensation
Shield Compensation

DPS skills:
Missile operation
Missile Bombardment
Missile Projection
Rapid Launch
Heavy Missiles

Fill in skills for other mods as you need them. Don't forget to use drones as well. They can be a major part of your DPS.

If you're not able to take the rats on in a Drake with your skills then you probably won't be able to do it in a Raven either and the Raven will take more of a beating and leave a bigger hole in your wallet than a Drake will.

[slog]

So you guys are thinking that this is really a skills issue?

Edit: If you guys get a moment, feel free to provide (or link some good loadouts!)

Edit2: I haven't been using Drones at all.  (maybe this is an issue?)

[Jayce]

Also be sure to fit explosive (and maybe kinetic) hardeners.  I think the thread linked earlier is for Sanshas, not Angels.  Stay away from Seraphim and Cherubim, they hit freakin hard.  I can't really effectively tank them for long even in an Ishtar.

Post your drake setup so we can see what you may be doing wrong.  Also what's your DPS according to EFT?

[Vedi]

Is your problem in the Drake that you cannot break the tank of the rats (i.e. it is a dps issue), or that you cannot tank the rats?

The Drake should actually be able to tank about as well as a Raven. It has bonuses to resists and a smaller sig radius while the Raven has neither. I think it is neither a ship or skill issue, but a fitting issue. Could you post how you fit your Drake? (Note: Any fitting will be critizised ;) ).

That said, ratting in a raven is much, much faster because the DPS is so much better. And yes, you should absolutely use drones.

[slog]

Is your problem in the Drake that you cannot break the tank of the rats (i.e. it is a dps issue), or that you cannot tank the rats?

The Drake should actually be able to tank about as well as a Raven. It has bonuses to resists and a smaller sig radius while the Raven has neither. I think it is neither a ship or skill issue, but a fitting issue. Could you post how you fit your Drake? (Note: Any fitting will be critizised ;) ).

That said, ratting in a raven is much, much faster because the DPS is so much better. And yes, you should absolutely use drones.

As a new player, it's hard for me to know if the problem is Shield Tank or DPS.  I'll post the fitting tonight.  I've been trying various ones out, some with more success than others, based on the loadouts in Eve-mon.

Edit: That being said, it takes them quite a few volleys to get my shields down.  How many volleys should I be able to absorb?

[Vedi]

Edit: That being said, it takes them quite a few volleys to get my shields down.  How many volleys should I be able to absorb?

Preferably, you should be able to tank them permanently. This should be the aim. Secondarily, you'd want to kill them faster than they kill you ;).

You know you have a dps problem if you cannot overcome the tank of the rat (i.e. if you essentially do less damage than it is able to heal). The recharge rate of shields is highest at around 30%, so you may be able to take it down towards that, but if you lack the DPS you might get stuck there. Then you have a DPS problem.

[xorx]

Very approximately skills wise you want:

Tactical Shield Manipulation IV
Shield Operation V

This will let you fit active explosive damp field IIs. This should give your drake 80-90% explosive resist. Thre add some large shield extender II or named extenders and you're away. Use a damage control II in the lows and then ballistic controls for extra dps. Cram high with named launchers. Avoid 'heavy assault' launchers. Use explosive ammo/

[Jayce]

the loadouts in Eve-mon.

If you're talking about the Battleclinic fits linked to from EVEMon, some of those are alright, but some of them are godawful.  As a noob it's hard to know the difference. I know because I used them too at first 

Have you looked at the fits on the Goon wiki?

[slog]

Edit: That being said, it takes them quite a few volleys to get my shields down.  How many volleys should I be able to absorb?

Preferably, you should be able to tank them permanently. This should be the aim. Secondarily, you'd want to kill them faster than they kill you ;).

You know you have a dps problem if you cannot overcome the tank of the rat (i.e. if you essentially do less damage than it is able to heal). The recharge rate of shields is highest at around 30%, so you may be able to take it down towards that, but if you lack the DPS you might get stuck there. Then you have a DPS problem.

I don't remember the types, but I was fighting 5 angels in 0.0 somewhere.  I was able to get one down to armor, but at that point I only had 75% shields left.  I was using Havoc missiles.

[Phildo]

Use drones.  They'll add significantly to your ability to break a rat's tank.  Five warrior IIs aren't a whole lot of DPS but when you've already broken the rat's tank they will make it die that much faster and are also great for warding off tacklers if you get attacked while ratting.

[Vedi]

Here's a low-skill Angel PvE ratting setup:

[Drake, Angel PvE]
Ballistic Control System I
Ballistic Control System I
Shield Power Relay I
Shield Power Relay I

Explosion Dampening Field I
Explosion Dampening Field I
Ballistic Deflection Field I
Large Subordinate Screen Stabilizer I
Large Subordinate Screen Stabilizer I
Large Subordinate Screen Stabilizer I

'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
'Malkuth' Heavy Missile Launcher I, Havoc Heavy Missile
Small Tractor Beam I

[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]
[empty rig slot]

Warrior I x5


This is what is called an passive tank. This means that is has no module that actively regenerate the shields. However, shields will regenerate naturally, and they will regnerate more the lower they are, up to a maximum rate at 33% of shields. This means that you should not be afraid to see that you go down to 75% of max shield  - that just means that you have not yet reached the highest regen rate. If you fall to 15-20% shields, you should warp out. If you need an even stronger tank, replace one of the Ballistic Control Units with a Damage Control Unit. Note that you do not need to use the "Large Subordinate Screen Amplifier" - take what is available and what you can afford, the better named variant of the Large Shield Extender, the better. If you can use T2s, great. (For more information about passive shield tanking, see this article.

This build should allow you to tank at least 250 dps of sustained damage, and leaves you with about a 100 000 effective HP buffer. The DPS is kinda low -  under 200 (the 5 warrior Is is about 30% of that), but should allow you to kill the lower end battleships. If you upgrade those Ballistic Control Units to named ones or to T2, or upgrade the drones, that'll count for a lot.

It it is good that you use Havoc ammo, that is right against Angels.

By the way, you should not try to passive tank a Raven if you upgrade to that. The optimal tank on a Raven involves a shield booster.

[slog]

Here was my initial current setup

[Drake, Newb Drake ]
Power Diagnostic System I
Ballistic Control System I
Ballistic Control System I
Ballistic Control System I

Kinetic Deflection Amplifier I
Large F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Large F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Medium Shield Extender I
Medium Shield Extender I
Explosion Dampening Amplifier I

Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Advanced 'Limos' Heavy Missile Bay I,
Salvager I

I changed the mids to:

[Drake, Experiment Current setup ]


Kinetic Deflection Amplifier I
Large F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Large F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Shield Recharger I
Shield Recharger I
Explosion Dampening Amplifier I

[Phildo]

Seems like you need to work on your fitting skills so you can swap the PDS with a shield power relay. Do that and notice how much faster your shields will recharge.

[slog]

I put the layour mentioned above into EFT.  Notice the red number in the upper left hand corners.  I don't know what they are ,but I assume it's bad.

[WayAbvPar]

Red number is capacitor- you are over the limit. If you train up Energy Management you can increase your overall cap, or train Shield Upgrades to reduce the cap hit from the mods.

[slog]

Notice the terrible DPS.   On the plus side, I should be able to do that fitting shortly.

[Phildo]

Red number is power grid actually.

[WayAbvPar]

Ah right. I always conflate cap and PG in my head. In that case, Energy Management won't help, but Shield Upgrades will.

[Phildo]

So will advanced weapon upgrades and engineering.

[slog]

the fitting works if I swap out a Large Screen Stabilizer for a Shield Recharger.  DPS still sucks ass though.

[IainC]

To be honest Drakes aren't known for their ferocious DPS. Sure yours is lower than it could be but even with decent skills your Drake is not going to be a gibbing machine. What it will do pretty well however is not die which makes it the most noob friendly option for most situations.

[WayAbvPar]

After reading that passive tanking article linked earlier, it sounds like that is why the Drake is popular (the tank). Drones will definitely help the DPS.

[Llyse]

Switch 1 shield power relay for a Power Diagnostic System and you'll have the Power grid to fit everything

[Goumindong]

You should probably stick Afterburners on those things.

A single AB will let a passive tanked arbitrator(3x extenders, 4x PDU) tank 3 angel rats up to 1m isk long enough to kill them.

Smaller stuff it won't, but larger stuff yes.

With the tank on a drake you can probably chew through the smaller stuff fast enough that an AB will let you tank anything else.

[slog]

Switch 1 shield power relay for a Power Diagnostic System and you'll have the Power grid to fit everything

still short

[slog]

soloed three angel commangers and 2 archangels.  This setup is much better, even with the shield recharger I in there.

[Llyse]

Switch for two power diagnostics?

Are you having problems tanking spawns?

I haven't had any problems with getting a Drake to tank spawns but I've got more skills so YMMV

Get your damage first since less time to kill = mo money and less tanking time required course.

Glad to hear you're doing better now though!

Btw if you can rat solo with a Drake now it'll be relatively easy to move to even faster/bettar ratting with a BS.

Just improve the skills the guys mentioned and you'll be a monster in spiny, blocked ravens.
You just need Cruise Missiles III and battleship III in addition to what you have.

So the ancillary skills (Weapons Upgrades, Warhead Upgrades, Shield management) all help when you upgrade to BS.

If you're aiming for Torpedo ratting though you'll need to improve the navigation set of skills to making it bearable (not suggested for now) for a slight upgrade in DPS

[WayAbvPar]

soloed three angel commangers and 2 archangels.  This setup is much better, even with the shield recharger I in there.

That should be good enough to rat in AZN- the BS spawns there are rarely much tougher than that, although the occasional Throne or Malakim shows up. And you can always warp to the station and reset your shields!

[Furiously]

I bought my first bs last night. My drone skills suck, I could only get 6 of the 8 guns which was ok since I fitted a salvager and tractor beam. Only doing like 275 dps. Should be able to get it up to 435 just working on a few skills. Or higher if I go for t2 guns.  The maelstrom is damn slow.  It's a bit odd to be flying around in a ship that cost 170m to setup. I'm so used to my 100dps AF's. Which at the extreme cost like 40mil. I'm not sure I like moving as slow as I was.

[Murgos]

I bought my first bs last night. My drone skills suck, I could only get 6 of the 8 guns which was ok since I fitted a salvager and tractor beam. Only doing like 275 dps. Should be able to get it up to 435 just working on a few skills. Or higher if I go for t2 guns.  The maelstrom is damn slow.  It's a bit odd to be flying around in a ship that cost 170m to setup. I'm so used to my 100dps AF's. Which at the extreme cost like 40mil. I'm not sure I like moving as slow as I was.

I bought my first BS and then put it in the hanger for another month once I realized how crappy my skills were.  I actually did less DPS and was more fragile in the BS than in a Battle Cruiser.