Since joining Matari Exodus I’ve been slowly changing my focus from frigates to heavier ships. I’ve been flying Tempests in gangs for quite a while but now I’ve started to cross-train into other races and fly battleships solo. However, I’m not made of ISK so rather than running around in expensive fits with trimark rigs and everything else, I’ve instead been seeing how cheaply I can put together an effective battleship for. Eventually I settled on the following fit:
[Megathron, Budget]
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
[Empty High slot]
Quad LiF Fueled I Booster Rockets
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Patterned Stasis Web I
Heavy F-RX Prototype I Capacitor Boost, Cap Booster 800
Damage Control II
Large 'Accommodation' Vestment Reconstructer I
Large 'Accommodation' Vestment Reconstructer I
Radioisotope Explosive Hardener I
Radioisotope Kinetic Hardener I
Radioisotope Thermic Hardener I
Radioisotope Adaptive Nano Membrane I
[Empty Rig slot]
[Empty Rig slot]
[Empty Rig slot]
Ogre II x5
With maximum skills this fit does 799 DPS and tanks 453.9 DPS with 65.1 kEHP. If you get the ship and parts from buy orders she’ll set you back about 92 million ISK and for 24 million ISK you can buy platinum insurance and get 80 million back when she dies. That means that each ship loss is going to set you back around 32 million ISK. That seems like a pretty good deal at first and its certainly a capable enough ship.
However, is it really the best value for money I can get? A triple repair Myrmidon costs a mere 60 million to fit and about 35 million to lose after insurance. That’s just a touch more than the Megathron. It will do 545 DPS and can repair up to 665 DPS so for that you get a little less damage but a lot more tank. You also have something that is more maneuverable, more engageable, and gets better DPS on small ships.
So where does this leave the so-called ghetto battleships? Do they have a purpose? I think they still do as training ships but the more I think about it, the more I think that they are better served by not scrimping so much on the fitting and just flying them as un-rigged T2 fits with T1 guns (at least for the time being).
[Megathron, Budget (T2 tank)]
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Large YF-12a Smartbomb
Quad LiF Fueled I Booster Rockets
X5 Prototype I Engine Enervator
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
Heavy F-RX Prototype I Capacitor Boost
Damage Control II
Large Armor Repairer II
Large Armor Repairer II
Armor Explosive Hardener II
Armor Kinetic Hardener II
Armor Thermic Hardener II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
[Empty Rig slot]
[Empty Rig slot]
[Empty Rig slot]
Ogre II x5
This fit costs just 5 million ISK more to fit than the previous version I suggested and boasts 582 DPS of tank and 767 DPS from its weapon systems. The reduced DPS is due to the increased fitting requirements of the T2 tank. I’m definitely going to give this fit a chance but I have a feeling Jaster is correct and the Myrmidon is a better choice. It just goes to show quite how powerful the battlecruiser class is in Eve’s current form.
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September 6th, 2011 at 11:37 am
Probably says more about the importance of those rigs – without them the tank on either a BC or BS is fairly flimsy and can easily be overwhelmed by a single ship of the same class.
Might be worthwhile upgrading to T2 scrambler & web since I would imagine you need all the tracking you can get. Also, I would personally go with a neut instead of a Smartbomb due to the number of Cynabals, Vagabonds etc. that you'll fight.
I'm looking forward to seeing how you do, I've just started flying Active Battleships myself and their tanks are insane.
Also, don't forget damage rigs – dirt cheap and they fit comfortably, as well as pills which are only 3m or so.
September 6th, 2011 at 12:12 pm
The trick is not to overly skimp and to look at the cost/benefit of components, not just in isolation, but also considering the the total cost, as you did for your T2 fit.
Apply the same thinking to the rigs. Rather than leave them empty, fill on up with some of the good cheap rigs.
Hybrid and projectile rigs are an obvious example. Shield resist rigs are another, they are a fraction the price of the more popular extender or purger rigs. This makes the likes a of a gank shield tanked tempest a good and cost effective option.
Also worth consideration is the really cheap BS hulls like armagedon, scorpion, typhoon and dominix, all of which are good cheap PvP ships. Though I admit insurance does remove a lot of the hull cost.
September 6th, 2011 at 1:33 pm
The thing that made me sad was realising that with the insurance changes I was losing 25 million or so on the hull alone. That kind of just made me ask why not fly a Myrmidon instead. Or at least made Jaster ask me that.
September 6th, 2011 at 1:34 pm
Smartbomb is simply because I fight more ECM drones than nanoships. Heck, I know at least one person who fits a smartbomb on their Maelstrom.
September 6th, 2011 at 2:06 pm
I was a little bit iffy until I got to the low slots, and then you completely lost me.
You can fly a cheap fit and still fit it well. Try a medium tech 2 cap booster to save on fitting space, then do a standard 2-2-2 fit. (2 EANMs, 2 Plates, 2 hybrid damage mods.) and a DC 2 of course.
The reasons you will have issues with your fit:
Cap
Little gank worth
Tech 2 mods aren't that expensive. it's mostly just the guns. But, if you can't afford to fit up a decent battleship, I'd stick with battlecruisers. Still the gank factor without as much isk investment.
The bottom line is to fly what you can fly and fit well…both skillwise and iskwise.
September 6th, 2011 at 4:05 pm
Smartbomb vs Neut is a personal choice, one of the reasons I think the Pest is so great – you don't have to choose between the two!
September 6th, 2011 at 4:07 pm
I'm not sure if you know what exactly he is trying to do – an active tanked Battleship is much, much better than a buffered Battleship for small gang/solo PvP since it will let you tank more over the course of a standard engagement.
Not to mention that the non-trimarked buffer on a standard 2-2-2 fit is laughably thin for a Battleship – a mere 90k EHP compared to the (overheated) 76k EHP on Wensley's ghetto-Mega meaning he just has to live for 20 seconds to have a longer tank.
Case in point, 2 Drakes could probably gank down your Megathron before they both die, whereas the ghetto-Mega can almost certainly kill them both with little difficulty.
September 6th, 2011 at 4:13 pm
You just have to focus on the advantages it has over the Myrm – namely much more resistant to neuts (bigger base cap, bigger cap booster) and much, much more DPS (800 vs ~500) which should offset the reduced tank somewhat.
September 7th, 2011 at 12:20 am
As John said, there really is no reason not to fit large hybrid burst/collision rigs if you're going for a cheap fit – they cost a few hundred k apiece and will net you an extra 100-ish DPS on either of your ghettothrons.
September 7th, 2011 at 6:21 am
There's been a couple of ghetto mega vids, at least one done by fmerc that you might want to look up.
Not all BS hulls take the loss of T2 guns & expensive rigs the same. The dominix has some great fittings with neuts, reps or gank that don't hinge on rigs. The ghetto geddon with gun rigs is a beast, and the typhoon is pretty damn nasty just using gun rigs and AC's. Nano pest can get by without barrage, though I'm not sure how you'd fare on the cost of named guns. You could give the Raven & Scorp a try with cheaper fittings: arbi launchers are nigh standard on normal T2 fit Ravens, and ECM doesn't really care what you throw at it.
September 7th, 2011 at 7:48 am
I've no idea how expensive large armor repper rigs are, so maybe this is totally irrelevant and destroys the purpose of a ghetto bs, but if you fork out for a couple of auxiliary's and a nanobot accel rig it dramatically increases your tanking ability.
I took the first fit you described and added these rigs, and it boosts the repping ability to 700 dps. Add a standard exile booster and o/h and you get a tank of over 1000dps. That's bloody good for such a cheap ship.
September 7th, 2011 at 8:14 am
Its a good point and I'll make the changes accordingly.
September 7th, 2011 at 8:17 am
Large armour rigs are pretty damned expensive. Sure, they make for cracking fits but the aim of the game here is to have the most cost-effective fun possible. The question becomes, at what point does cutting back become a false economy.
September 8th, 2011 at 2:17 am
This is unrelated to the post, but whatever. I've been unsubbed for a while now and I wanted to say hello. I miss you guys.
September 8th, 2011 at 7:41 am
We miss you too!
September 8th, 2011 at 7:53 am
I found some footage of some ghetto mega action in Shiroi Okami's "Freestyle". It inspired me to try it and it works surprisingly well. Got a few mails with it before getting ganked but it was fun and loss was minimal.
Shiroi's fit:
[Megathron, Ghetto Mega]
1600mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
1600mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Damage Control II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Large Armor Repairer II
Quad LiF Fueled I Booster Rockets
X5 Prototype I Engine Enervator
Warp Disruptor II
Heavy Capacitor Booster II, Cap Booster 800
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Electron Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Modal Mega Ion Particle Accelerator I, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Heavy Unstable Power Fluctuator I
Large Hybrid Burst Aerator I
Large Hybrid Collision Accelerator I
[empty rig slot]
Ogre II x5
September 14th, 2011 at 8:44 pm
What's a battleship again? :p
September 22nd, 2011 at 11:20 am
Or as you're minnie, you could go for the Hurridon (dropping t2 where appropriate for guns). I put this together so my friend who's still not cross-trained much out of Gallente could usefully join our 2-3 man lowsec nano BC gangs. I know people tend to put ACs on shield myrms but if you want to get in fast and brawl this works quite well. (awaits howls of derision.)
[Myrmidon,weirdidon]
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Damage Control II
Invulnerability Field II
Warp Scrambler II
Large Shield Extender II
Large Shield Extender II
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon I Microwarpdrive
Heavy Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Heavy Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Heavy Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Heavy Neutron Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Heavy Ion Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Heavy Ion Blaster II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge M
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Hammerhead II x2
Hobgoblin II x1
Ogre I x2
721 dps (789 o/h), 58k ehp, 1316m/s (1867o/h)
September 22nd, 2011 at 11:30 am
The problem with using the Myrmidon like that is the fact that you rely on the drones for so much of your DPS. There's almost no point whatsover when the Hurricane and Drake outperform it so handily. I would go as far as to say a T1 gunner Hurricane is a better option.
September 22nd, 2011 at 11:45 am
Well a HAM drake with a couple of BCS (assuming you're trying to be fast like the one above, with a couple of nanos) does less dps than the myrm above when you remove drones from the equation on both sides. Does have a fair bit more ehp of course and does dps at 20km. I'm a little leery of cane dps personally, to get anything like paper dps you really need to be in around 9km without barrage, so range advantage isn't huge, thought it is there.
Anyway as I say, really the purpose of this fit was to get someone who is basically all gallente, bar some shield skills, to be able to participate. This probably wasn't really the right place to paste it.
September 22nd, 2011 at 11:55 am
Comparing it with a HAM Drake doesn't really fit, either, to be honest. By putting the nanofibres in you've made it in the mould of a kiting BC like the Hurricane or HML Drake. These don't have the massive DPS values of the brawler but do have the safety of range. Living life by DPS numbers can be a dangerous game. Also, you're right, its not really relevant to the discussion in hand.
October 18th, 2011 at 3:43 pm
Only cockbags active tank a Megathron. You want to active tank, you use a Domi or a Hyp or a Myrm. You want to go balls out with giant blasters and DPS someones face off, you buffer tank a Megathron. What you have posted above is an abomination, my friend.
October 18th, 2011 at 7:16 pm
Aren't you supposed to be off hunting orcs in WoW or something like that?
January 15th, 2012 at 2:57 am
Fitting specifics aside, I'm interested to learn what kind of fights you're getting in a solo battleship.
January 19th, 2012 at 5:21 pm
I've only done it a couple of times. You're looking for small groups of BCs without too much neuting power.