Heavy Assault Cruiser, worth to go for?

[Jarkko]

I've been looking at the different ships in the game. I've started to think Heavy Assault Cruiser is what I want to be able to use. However, going for takes lots of time to get to (about 3 months), so I wonder if that is a sane goal at this point of my gaming career.

As an intermediate goal I'd want to be using the Harpy Assault Ship. It will take about two weeks (13 days according to EVEmon, but I'll throw in an extra day for unseen problems ), but then I'd have a gun-platform that would make me drool (if I get it right, my light railguns will be hitting stuff from 50km, if I just can figure out how to target things at that range). While getting there I will hit Engineering and Mechanic V, which as far as I can see will be useful no matter what thing I fly in the future.

While flying the Harpy I'd start to go for Cruiser skills and change to that when I have decent skills for that (in January), then continue towards HAC. I'd be flying the Eagle with decent skills for it in March.


Or should I go the dull route of Cruisers - BattleCruisers as every newbie guide seems to advocate.

[Mangala]

Its a doable aim - and those ship classes are worth the time you have looked into too

For pve, both ship classes are amazing. As can be seen by me doing Level 4's in both the AF and the HAC

As for targeting at 50KM. Long Range Targeting skill

[Jarkko]

Heheh, just noticed getting Assault Ship I isn't exactly enough to fly an Assault Ship    I need to get Frigates V too, so it pushes the schedule forwards 12 days. Thus I'll be able to fly an Assault ship on New Years eve, except that I am at work until pretty close midnight. Thus I'll be able to start the new year with a new ship, will fly my Dessie until that  

[Warcold]

Sorry, but what is so good about an assault ship? isnt it just a frigate with some more armor?

Not trying to be cocky, just trying not to be confused...

[Jarkko]

Sorry, but what is so good about an assault ship? isnt it just a frigate with some more armor?

It's a frigate with a "Holy crap!" range on its guns   The idea is to shoot things dead before they have a chance to return fire.


For Caldari (which I have focused on)

A normal frigate does have a range of max 10km with its railguns (can't really have the bigger guns mounted). Thus you have to rely on the slow missile launchers, and risk at being shot dead.

A destroyer has a range of around 35 km (my destroyer has a range of 30 km) with its railguns. It means it can shoot for about 15 km while the faster small ships oh-so-slowly try to get into range (in my experience I can shoot down 11 PvE frigates without getting shot at once).

A cruiser (other than Moa) has a max range of around 30 km. The Moa has about 45 km range on its guns. You can use rigs to make this better though.


The "normal" assault ships come in two variations. The shooty version (Harpy for Caldari) has a range (if I can calculate right) of 50 km initially. It means a Harpy will most likely win even cruisers without a sweat (because the Harpy is faster than any cruiser, and thus can be shooting from ranges the cruiser can not return fire from), unless the cruiser gets the "jump" (get closer than 30 km unnoticed). Even some battlecruisers are no sweat (ok, it will prolly take quite a while...) for an assault ship.

The Heavy Assault ship has a range of 70+ km. It will be able to nuke down battlecruisers, and even give battleships a run for the money.


All this in PvE, and from theorycrafting point of view. I am sure these are not viable tactics in PvP, and a reality check may cause some interference with my cool theorycrafting

[Rubino]

I don't know if much has changed but HAC used to be able to hold ships to ransom.
They have a super tank - so you pick a nice juicy target - get it down to hull and open comms....

[Baptiste]

Speaking of ships, is it worth me sticking with Gallente ships if I want to pvp? I remember reading a while back that drones are easy targets and they just add to lag. Should I switch out before I get up to my chin on this route?

[Mangala]

Speaking of ships, is it worth me sticking with Gallente ships if I want to pvp? I remember reading a while back that drones are easy targets and they just add to lag. Should I switch out before I get up to my chin on this route?

Drones do add a little to lag, but not when theres a couple of small gangs using them - its when you get to the 100's if not more seen in fleet fights - however CCP have begun testing on SiSi a game option that doesnt render drones at all, so less client and server lag

As for Gallente in PVP - all races have a use. Gallente have some good boats over and above their drone ships. The Thorax (flying space penis) is still useful - gangs of these things with varyingt ypes of drone are still great to field; The Mega is a reasonable sniper platform, the Domi has its usefulness in that you can tank its arse off and soak up damage while your gang does its job. Their T2 variants, HAC's, AF's and the like are even now still very worth a skill path, still exlempary if used by a non-idiot on the field.

[Rubino]

And if you have the drone skills - you can tear 'em a new one.
A decent tank and with a Domi you can afk missions.

[Macrune]

Battle Cruisers are my short term goal. I should be up and running in my FEROX by Wednesday.

Quick question time for you folks.

Why does it take so much longer to get to the Heavy assault ships but when i compare them to the Battle Cruisers. The Battle Cruisers seem considerably better. The only advantage i could see was a 10km longer firing range on the HAS.
The two i were looking at were the FEROX BC and the EAGLE HAS.

Eagle                                                                              Ferox

powergrid output  875                                                       powergrid output  1000
low slots 4                                                                      low slots 4
med slots 5                                                                     med slots 5
high slots 6                                                                     high slots 7
cpu output 438                                                                cpu output 475
launcher hardpoints 2                                                        launcher hardpoints 5
turret hardpoints 4                                                           turret hardpoints 5
shield capacity 2109                                                         shield capacity 4883
armor hitpoints 1266                                                         armor hitpoints 3419
max velocity 175                                                              max velocity 140
drone capacity 0                                                              drone capacity 25
capacity 450m3                                                               capacity 345 m3
maximum targeting range 70 km                                          maximum targeting range 60 km
max locked targets 8                                                        max locked targets 8
rig slots 2                                                                       rig slots 3
upgrade hardpoints 2                                                        upgrade hardpoints 3
baseprice ISK 17,062,524.00                                              baseprice ISK 24,000,000.00

Yes, providing the Ferox doesnt get the drop on the Eagle the eagle should be able to keep out of range of it (its faster as well) and gradually wear the Ferox down but in just about every stat other than firing range and speed the Ferox is superior or is there something this noob has missed. I just cant see the point of spending extra time training up to get a HAS when the BC seems better on paper.










   
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
   
 
 

[Mangala]

HAC's or HAS's have better overall resists than both cruisers and if memory serves the tier 1 (eve has both tiers and Tech levels of ships...) BC's so is often many players ship of choice, that and Tech 2 BC's are command ships and are considerably harder to skill for.

[Jarkko]

You get a 10% range increase per skill level in Battlecruiser for the Ferox. Thus at maximum 50% increase.

You get a 10% range increase per skill level in Caldari Cruiser *and* Heavy Assault ship. Thus at maximum 100% increase.


Let's assume you have a 250mm Prototype Gauss Gun (optimal range 29km) and boosting that with other skills and gear to ~35 km. Lets assume you have Skill V in Battlecruiser, Cruiser and Heavy Assault ship*

The Ferox thus would have an optimal range of ~53 km, while the Eagle would have an optimal range of 70km. That would a 17km gap in favor of the Eagle, ie the faster ship, which is also harder to hit (smaller target) and harder to damage (higher resists). Still, if the Ferox get the jump on the Eagle, then I'd believe the Eagle to be toast unless the Eagle can manouver to hell out Philadelphia *fast*.



*For the sake of argument:
If we assume minimum possible skill to take the ship out, you'd need Battlecruiser I for the Ferox (just a 10% increase to optimal range, ie ~38km in this example) while you need Cruiser V and HAS I for Eagle (a 60% increase to range, ie 56 km optimal range in this example).

[vacuum]

HACs vary in their uses. The eagle is a sniper ship, you can instapop a pod, interceptor or other from >150K with good hybrid skills. In the case of the Eagle, it's all about sniping range. However, I'm not convinced for missiles ..

On the whole HACs are more manoeuverable than battlecruisers (big difference) and this matters for getting effective size/speed ratio to be able to minimise damage from battleships and bigger ships.

I started writing this thinking 'ah, should be reasonably easy to fit a HAC to out damage/tank a drake, let's try ...' - however from a missiles perspective, this isn't true (see below).

I've PVE built two passive shield builds - the drake has many advantages, which we'll discuss below:





1. Drake is Tier 1 (thus fully insurable)
2. Drake can be flown with a lot less skills wise
3. Seems that the passive tank is a lot stronger, and although it's not cap stable (whereas the cerb is), it's *nearly* cap stable.
4. Not a huge difference on DPS, but the alpha strike is a lot stronger.

So, hmmm ....

[Macrune]

Thanks guys.

Im happy to say i understood all of what was said there  which shows im making some headway in this game.
I think i'll probably stick with a BC for the time being and then concentrate on other skills and mission repping for a while before looking to go bigger and badder.
I don't think being cap stable at this stage will lose me a great deal as if im still in a battle when i run out of juice then its a battle i shouldnt have been in in the first place 

[Macrune]

Vac what mod is that you used to do the ship setups? and where can i get it..