TENGU - CHEAP

If you buy a battleship with less than 20M SP and your are not trained exclusively for that ship you WILL lose it and lose it often.

A low SP character isn't going to get anything out of a 300M battleship and i don't know if you checked the prices lately but its going to cost more than 300M to fit out a battleship. Affording a tengu isn't really that expensive since that fit will run you about 650M and that's easily obtainable in a drake while you skill for the tengu.

If 650M isk seems like a lot and you are that low on SP, do not buy a battleship or a Tengu, you will just lose them. Drakes are the mission ship of choice for low SP characters due to they're low cost and easy tanks, especially with low SP. In addition as you train skills to improve your drake you will also be skilling up the Tengu simultaneously.

If you buy a battleship with less than 20M SP and your are not trained exclusively for that ship you WILL lose it and lose it often. Also, with Amarr battleships (amarr only) they benefit from a semi-conductor rig combo more than a CCC rig since they already have a larger than average capacitor.

Tengu better than a battleship at running missions riiiiiiiight

If your low SP, DONT FLY A BATTLESHIP!!!! ... Words ...

I've done plenty of missions in loki and it was way better than maelstrom. Machariel beats loki, but loki > mael. 600m/s, perma med-boost tank, low signature -> I almost never fell under 95% of my shield, frigates and cruisers die really fast, BSes takes time but on low range u hit for 500~ every shot. I bought mael just to compare it in level 4s after using loki for some time and i got mad really fast.

and what are your relevant BS skills?

670 DPS is extraordinarily low for a battleship, my myrmidon can put out 600 DPS to 52km........

I think you'll find that battleships are better in the long run but it will require more time investment (though if you're flying a t3 it's about the same tbh).

A t2 fit mael should do about 900ish gun DPS and if we account for level 4 skills it's still 720ish pure gun dps before drones (80% of level 5).

You can also quite easily fit a MWD on a AC fit and a mael can even be usable with 1200mm artillery which puts out about 130 less dps than the AC fit but at much longer ranges.

All level V - 750dps. ACII, gyrostabilizers II.

4 gyros? faction ammo?

As cute as all this is.........

It doesn't do it with a L4 tank.

Once you got the L4 tank the dps falls off a cliff.

As cute as all this is.........

It doesn't do it with a L4 tank.

Once you got the L4 tank the dps falls off a cliff.

Offtopic, but it can be useful - Is it better to get shield boost amplifier over Invul field?

dominix is back with a launch-drones-and-afk vengeance.

transfer into incursions: not so much. But gals BS V will be nice for megathrons/vindis

I don't understand, you only need 4 slots to tank a maelstrom for level 4s.

[Maelstrom, 800mmpve]
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Republic Fleet Gyrostabilizer
Tracking Enhancer II

Dread Guristas X-Large Shield Booster
Explosive Deflection Field II
Shield Boost Amplifier II
Kinetic Deflection Field II
Prototype 100MN Microwarpdrive I
Tracking Computer II, Optimal Range Script

800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L
800mm Repeating Artillery II, EMP L

Large Projectile Ambit Extension I
Large Core Defense Capacitor Safeguard I
Large Core Defense Capacitor Safeguard I

My question on this, though: are ACs advisable for L4s if they're only Meta 4s? That obviously frees up a ton of fitting for something like a MWD, but how well will you be able to stay in range, and is it going to adversely affect your tank with it on?

Autocannons were borderline on a Maelstrom due to its slow speed even with barrage available. 1400 arties are better in practice even if you need to use an ACR to fit them and a prop mod which you will want. With the TE nerf autocannons on a Maelstrom are even worse and I'd say artillery is the clear winner. The things that keeps arties competitive is faction ammo. Chewing through faction ammo with autocannons hurts (still worth it though, arguably) but using faction ammo on artillery with its slow cycle time is very cost effective. You can even use an MJD to make a kiting setup with artillery but I wouldn't recommend that for anything with a gate, use an AB or MWD instead.

What I did was I used a Maelstrom with M4 artillery until I could fly my Machariel with T2 autocannons, then I swapped to autos though I've been tempted to mess with an artillery Machariel and an MJD, just to change things up.

Edit: M4 800s vs 1400s Both using faction ammo the arties start outperforming at 24.5km, using regular ammo on the autocannons brings this down to 20. Tracking speed used on arties, optimal range used on 800s, most optimal for each of them in terms of projection in their intersecting range.

Use artillery, learn to ungroup your guns so you don't overshoot on small targets, 1 gun per frig etc. The other fun thing is that even though arty tracking is significantly worse you can simply match your target's transversal by using camera to look at them, point it in the direction of their ship and double click the space in front of them. You are now running parallel and minimizing transversal, your artillery should hit any battlecruiser or bigger even at **** touching range if you made the mistake of letting them get that close in the first place.