Destination SkillQueue
Are We There Yet
24
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Posted - 2011.11.03 15:26:00 -
[1] - Quote
About exloration in general, outside highsec your exploration ship has to be able to do combat. Even in highsec you can only do salvage/hacking sites without decent combat capability. In other areas even those sites can spawn a significant number of combat ships, so some combat capability is a must for the ship doing the actual sites. Having a dedicated scanning ship isn't a bad idea, since it will make exploring and scanning sites much easier, but it isn't a must. You can also carry two or more fits with your exploration ship. This way you can just dock at a station and change fits as you need and it will help if you can't fit all you think you need at the same time.
As for skills, you just need to be able to scan well and do the combat in the sites. A good scanning ship would help here and it should preferably be one with an in built bonus for scan strength with some scan strength rigs(gravity capacitor upgrade) fitted. Covops ships(Helios for gallente) are really good for this, but a normal ship will also do. Scanning will be harder though and you might not be able to scan the hard sites down at all without good scanning skills in a normal ship, but those sites aren't ones you want to do in a weak ship anyway.
Highsec exploration can be a bit more complex that lowsec exploration and the competition is much more fierce. The reason it's more complex is, that in highsec you have heavy limitations on what ships can access the sites available. Smallest sites accept only frigates, while largest sites can require BC level firepower or tank to easily complete. The thing is that you can't just ignore the smaller sites, since the loot drops and escalations can be just as valuable there as in the larger sites. A cruiser size vessel is propably the best though and a T3 ship is the optimal choice in hichsec. I would favor one over an ishtar, since they are faster at completing the sites and speed is everything in highsec exploration, although Ishtar is a great exploration ship too.
As you are a gallente pilot, I would recommed starting with a vexor at first or even an imicus, if you've just started playing. A vexor is a decent exploration ship and can do almost all sites without an issue, if you are a competent pilot. It might struggle with the harder sites, since it has a weak tank and not that much firepower, but it's a decent starter ship and you can earn the initial investment cost back from a single hacking site. An assault ship or a faction frigate is also a good option in highsec, since they can speedrun most sites and nab all the tasty loot right infront of other people's noses. I wouldn't recommend them for a new explorer though, since you really need to know what you're doing before you get the most out of them and you need to know what sites they simply can't do. On the other hand they are great at doing the easier sites and can easily escape when you find a site that is too hard for them, so they might not be a bad option to start with.
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