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2008.01.24
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It's been a long time coming but I finally got some time in between university work to finished the next part of The Anatomy of PvP. In the first parts of the series, I examined Eve's PvP from a general point of view and went on to discuss one role in particular - the tackler. In this part of the guide, I'll examine the roles of electronic warfare specialists and how they relate to gang warfare in high security space. Because this Part 1.2 - Electronic warfareContents:
Electronic warfare is an aspect of gang warfare that is often overlooked by newer gangs but it is often a more decisive factor in victory than number of pilots or skillpoints. If you're planning on hitting a gang that's larger or more skilled than your own, it is essential to have a good balance of electronic warfare pilots in your gang. While each pilot flying an EW ship could instead be flying a damage-dealer or tackler, a well-deployed EW ship can effectively neutralise more than its own weight of enemy ships, cutting the enemy fleet's effectiveness down to size. Because of this ability to help a gang fight toe-to-toe with larger fleets, electronic warfare is often referred to as a force multiplier, multiplying your fleet's effectiveness against the enemy fleet. As was discussed in the first part of this guide, electronic warfare is primarily the usage of ECM to jam the enemy's targeting sensors, sensor dampeners to reduce their targeting speed or targeting range and tracking disruptors to make enemy turret-based weapons track badly enough to miss your ships. Target painters, energy neutralisers and nosferatu may also fall into the realm of electronic warfare and there are certainly ships which specialise in them. Apart from target painters, which make enemy ships easier to hit, all of these modules are designed to cripple enemy ships or render them inert, effectively removing them entirely from the battle. 1.21 - Electronic Counter Measures: Electronic Counter Measures, or ECM for short, refers specifically to modules which attempt to disrupt the enemy's target lock. This not only breaks all of the enemy's current target locks but also prevents them from locking anyone for the duration of the module's operation. An ECM jammer has a specific signal strength for each of the four sensor types, representing how well it jams ships with that sensor type. Each time the module activates, it has a chance to target-jam the enemy based on the signal strength of the ECM module and the enemy's highest sensor strength. For example, if the enemy is a ship with 20 magnetometric sensor strength and the jammer being used on him has a magnetometric signal strength of 10, there's a 10/20 chance (simplified to 1/2 or 50%) that the jammer will work on each cycle. When talking about ECM jammers, we refer to two different types called racial and multispectral which differ only in the distribution of their signal strengths. The multispectral version has equal signal strength in all four sensor types, meaning it jams all ships equally well and makes a good choice if you don't know what ships the enemy fleet will be composed of. The downside of this is that its signal strength is quite low so your chance to jam the enemy isn't very high. Racial jammers are specialised versions that are higher in one particular sensor type and low in the remaining three. A magnetometric jammer, for example, has a high magnetometric signal strength and low Radar, Ladar and Gravimetric signal strength. This makes it ideal for jamming Gallente ships, which use magnetometric sensors. All ships of a particular race use the same sensor type so if you know what race of ships your enemies tend to fly, you can choose racial jammers tuned to that sensor type. The sensor types each race's ships use are below:
Required skills Electronic Warfare - The very basic skill required to use an ECM jammer is electronic warfare level 1. This is enough to use standard Tech 1 or named jammers and the skill itself reduces the capacitor need of ECM modules by 5% per level. Given how capacitor-hungry ECM jammers start to get when you have four or more of them running constantly, this is a great skill to get to level 4 when you have time. Higher level in this will help you run your jammers more easily when fitted to smaller ships like frigates and cruisers. Level 4 Electronic Warfare skill carries the added bonus of allowing you to use Tech level 2 ECM jammers, which have 20% increased strength over the standard tech 1 versions. Frequency modulation - This skill is useful because it modifies ECM, sensor dampeners, tracking disruptors AND target painters, making it very good value for your training time. The bonus it gives is 10% per level to the falloff of your module, which may not seem too useful until you remember how ECM works at long range. The strength is 100% until you hit your optimal range (for an ECM jammer this can be over 50km) and after that, jammer strength decreases. At a distance of your optimal range plus your falloff, the jammer's strength is only 50% of what it previously was. At a distance of optimal plus two times your falloff, the jammer stops being any use at all. This skill is therefore essential for your long range ECM ships that are using their distance from the enemy to keep safe and is very useful for jamming snipers that may be over 50km away. Long Distance Jamming - Like frequency modulation, this skill affects all forms of Electronic warfare. However, Long Distance Jamming is a lot more useful because it increases the optimal range of your electronic warfare by 10% per level. To put this into perspective, a Tech 2 Ion Field Projector (the magnetometric specialised ECM jammer) has a base optimal range of 54km and having this skill to level 4 increases that to over 75km. That means your jammer will be 100% effective up to a range of 75km and could even jam targets over 100km away with some degree of success. This bonus is on top of the bonuses to ECM jammer optimal range that various ships have, meaning with good skills and a good ship you can feasibly project your ECM over 150km and really ruin a long range sniper battleship's day. Signal Dispersion - A very useful skill, Signal Dispersion increases the strength of all your ECM jammers by 5% per level. This is in addition to bonuses from signal distortion amplifiers and like the bonus from long distance jamming, this compounds with ship bonuses to great effect. To be sure of a reasonably good jamming chance, you should train this skill to at least level 4 and use an appropriate ship with signal distortion amplifiers. ECM gear The ECM jammer modules themselves are listed on the market under Ship Equipment, then Electronic Warfare and finally Electronic Counter Measures. While you can usually get away with just using Tech 1 jammers if you're practising on a throwaway ship, for high performance at a decent price you can't beat Tech 2. Tech level 2 ECM jammers have the same stats as the best named versions but are typically a lot cheaper to buy. The downside to these for newer pilots are the skill requirements but as the skills to use tech 2 jammers are desirable for every electronic warfare specialist to have, it shouldn't be long before you're trained up to use them. Named jammers like the "'Hypnos' Multispectral ECM I" have the benefit of lower capacitor usage compared to their tech 1 or tech 2 counterparts and the best named version has the same strength as the tech 2 version. Even so, their cost may be prohibitive compared to Tech 2 gear. The other essential module for an ECM ship is a Signal Distortion Amplifier, a low slot module that increases the strength of your ECM jammers significantly. One or two of these on every ECM specialist ship is a must-have but remember that they're subject to stacking penalty, so adding a third at the cost of another useful module isn't a good idea and adding a fourth will be practically pointless. A sensor booster with a scan resolution script is another welcome addition to ECM ships, allowing them to target their chosen enemy ship quickly. As you might be targeting the enemy's own electronic warfare specialist ships, it's very important that you lock them before they lock you. For pilots specialising in projecting ECM from a long distance away using a small ship like a cruiser, though, a sensor booster with a targeting range script is practically essential. More important than your modules is the ship they're fitted on. Very few ships have actual bonuses to ECM jammers and those that do are all Caldari so if you're not trained to fly Caldari ships, you may want to give ECM jamming a miss and go with another form of electronic warfare. You can fit ECM jammers on non-specialist ships but their effectiveness is severely diminished, usually to the point that they aren't worth using over more useful modules that fit in your medium slots. The best ships for ECM jamming are:
Common tactics Common tactics involving ECM jamming in high-security space usually involve dropping the ECM specialist ship on top of a fight after it has begun to turn the tide in your favour. For example, if an enemy wartarget in a battleship has been spotted camping a stargate, sending in your own battleship or two may scare him off and make him jump through to escape. In this case, you could send in something smaller and weaker such as one or two normal cruisers fitted out for high damage to fight him. Once he engages, he cannot jump through the stargate for 60 seconds so the idea is to make him think that the fight is a sure victory in his favour by throwing a weak target against him. Once he engages, the ECM ship warps in and target jams him, completely removing the threat he poses to the weak cruisers while they blow him up. This is an example of how Electronic warfare can allow small forces and ships to take on much larger ones and win. The majority of ECM specialist ships are not very tough and while they have plenty of mid slots to fit with shield modules, fitting those will waste valuable mid slots that could be used for jammers and sensor boosters. This means that a ship fitted out well for ECM will be very weak, necessitating tactics such as the one described above where the ECM ship warps in mid-fight. A lot of gang warfare in high security space is down to keeping your own ships safe and with ships as paper-thin as ECM specialists, you're going to need all the tips and hints you can get to keep your ship safe. The tips that help with survival in electronic warfare specialist ships apply to all kinds of EW and not just ECM so later in this guide I will talk about survival for a while. 1.22 - Remote Sensor Dampeners: Sensor dampeners are an electronic warfare module of Gallentean origin. They reduce the enemy's scan resolution and maximum targeting range. Like a number of modules, sensor dampeners can use a script to modify their operation. A scan resolution dampening script will double the effect of the module on the enemy's scan resolution at the cost of removing its detrimental effects to maximum targeting range. Similarly, the targeting range dampening script doubles the effect on the enemy's maximum targeting distance but removes its effect on scan resolution. The purpose of the sensor dampener is to make it more difficult for an enemy to target your team. Pointing a few dampeners using the scan resolution script at an enemy battleship could cause his lock time on your smaller ships such as frigates to rise above an acceptable level, making him unable to target them quickly. Using the targeting range scripts can reduce the battleship's targeting range so low that he can't target your ships unless they are very close, giving some degree of protection to long range support or sniping battleships. Required skills Frequency modulation - Just like with ECM jammers, this skill gives 10% per level to the falloff of your module. Since remote sensor dampeners tend to have very small optimal ranges (25km+), you're usually going to be using your dampeners on people who are past your optimal and so an increase in falloff distance is desirable. If a target is between your optimal range and optimal plus falloff, larger falloff will effectively increase the strength of the dampener. Long Distance Jamming - This skill is essential for remote sensor dampeners as it increases their optimal range by 10% per level. Since remote sensor dampeners have a lower base range than ECM jammers, this skill is essential for evening the field. Sensor linking - While not required, this handy skill reduces the capacitor use of your remote sensor dampeners by 5% per level. This will be useful if you intend to use the module on frigates but is otherwise not significant. Signal Suppression - This essential skill increases the strength of sensor dampeners by 5% per level. Sensor Dampening gear Like ECM jammers, standard Tech 1 sensor dampeners are available on the market for a very low cost. More experienced pilots will want to use Tech 2 sensor damps as they're fairly cheap and offer a large performance boost over tech 1. As with ECM jammers, ships with sensor dampeners benefit from the pilot using one or more sensor boosters with the scan resolution script fitted as the first person to lock their target may have a decisive advantage. The best ships for Sensor Dampening are:
Common tactics Unlike ECM jammers, remote sensor dampeners don't have enough range to be deployed effectively from over 100km away. A dedicated electronic warfare specialist using sensor dampeners will need some help working this into his tactics. The short-and-fast solution is to increase the module's range by training up the Long Distance Jamming skill and using Particle Dispersion Projector rigs. Each Particle Dispersion Projector I rig used on a ship increases sensor dampener optimal range by a respectable 20%, which multiplies your optimal range by 1.2. There is a stacking penalty applied for using more than one of the rig but because of how the bonuses multiply together when applied to your modules, this doesn't majorly affect additional rigs until you apply a third. One rig adds 20%, two rigs adds a total of 40.88% and three of this rig adds a total of 56.9%. The cost of these rigs is quite reasonable at 3.2m each at the time of writing this. This price makes them prohibitively expensive on frigates and also on cruisers if you think you might lose the ship in combat but for the experienced pilot who likes to fly recon ships or even just the Celestis with an expensive fitting, it's practically nothing. For pilots that can't afford to increase their optimal range using rigs or have other rigs planned for their ship setup, there are a number of tactical options available to deal with using the sensor dampeners at low range. The most obvious one is to fit your dampeners with targeting range dampening scripts to decrease the enemy's maximum targeting range. To defend yourself, you can stay at a reasonable distance from the enemy of 30-50km and turn your dampeners on any enemy that locks you. If their maximum targeting range is decreased to below your distance from them, they will lose their target lock. Since remote sensor dampeners have a long falloff range, a respectable 50km before skills on standard tech 1 versions, they will still be partially effective beyond optimal range. For example, if your optimal range is 40km and your falloff is 60km, staying between 40 and 100km (40+60) from the enemy is strongly advised to keep your dampeners between 100% and 50% effectiveness. As was mentioned in the ECM Jammer tactics section, sensor dampeners with scan resolution dampening scripts can be combined with ECM Jammers to great effect. If your fleet contains ECM specialists and sensor dampener specialist ships, you can have them co-ordinate their EW on the same targets to increase the time it takes the enemy to lock anyone if he resists a cycle of the ECM jammer. Sensor dampeners with the targeting range dampening script can be used to prevent enemy sniper groups from being able to attack at their preferred range and even to prevent normal enemies locking while your damage-dealers and tacklers approach by reducing their lock range significantly with your dampeners. Additionally, just as ECM Jammers can be used as anti-EW platforms by target jamming the enemy's electronic warfare specialists, sensor dampeners can be used in the same role by forcing the enemy's EW ships to get closer in order to be able to lock your ships. It won't prevent them from locking once they get closer but the closer they get to your ships, the easier they are to tackle and destroy. 1.23 - Tracking Disruptors: Tracking disruptors are an often overlooked form of electronic warfare that can sometimes be employed to great effect. These reduce the enemy's turret tracking speed and optimal range, which doesn't affect missiles or target locks at all but can completely ruin the effectiveness of your enemy's turrets. As with sensor dampeners, these can use a script to double one of their effects and remove the other. A tracking speed disruption script will double the penalty to turret tracking speed but remove the optimal range penalty and an optimal range disruption script will double the optimal range penalty but remove the effect on tracking speed. When lowering optimal range, the tracking disruptor also lowers turret falloff ranges as well. Tracking disruptors are a very niche form of EW that can only be effectively applied in certain situations. Since a lot of ships have missile hardpoints and drone bays, tracking disruptors alone are often not enough to neutralise an enemy entirely. Additionally, since they don't affect the target's targeting ability, they can still use other modules against you such as their own electronic warfare modules. Required skills Frequency modulation - As with all previous forms of electronic warfare mentioned, this skill gives 10% per level to the falloff of tracking disruptors. If you plan to use tracking disruptors from near or beyond their optimal range, this skill will increase their effectiveness. Otherwise this skill won't help a lot. Long Distance Jamming - This skill increases tracking disruptor optimal range by 10% per level. Since no ships have bonuses to the range of tracking disruptors, this skill is essential to pilots who want to use their tracking disruptors against enemy snipers at distances of over 70km. Turret Destabilization - A simple 5% per level to the strength of your tracking disruptors. This skill is essential for all tracking disruptor specialists and it is recommended that it be trained up to level 4. Weapon Disruption - The basic skill required to use tracking disruptors, this skill reduces their capacitor usage by 5% per level. Since tech 2 versions of the module only require this at level 2 and tracking disruptors don't use much capacitor in the first place, this skill is of little use trained past level 2. Tracking disruptor gear One advantage of tracking disruptors not being a very popular form of electronic warfare is that good gear for the role is usually very cheap. Named and tech 2 versions should be available at reasonable prices on your local market. Because the build cost of Tech 2 modules is higher than the refine value of tech 1 modules, you may find that the best named versions are actually cheaper than tech 2. The best ships for tracking disrupting are:
Common tactics Tracking disruptors are best applied in packs of small, fast ships taking on one or more larger targets that you know will be using turrets. Using a optimal range disruption script, a squad of small, fast ships with tracking disruptors can get in close and disrupt enemy snipers, making them unable to hit their intended targets. Alternatively, using the tracking speed disruption script, they can get in close to enemies with short-range turrets, orbit them and disrupt the enemy turrets so that they can't track their small ships. 1.24 - Energy neutralisers and Nosferatu: While nosferatu are still able to leech energy when you are lower on capacitor than your enemy, they are no longer the effective capacitor-nukers that they once were. Energy neutralisers, on the other hand, are still the kings of their field. Most ship setups in eve require capacitor in order to run hardeners to improve resistance, shield boosters or armour repairers to tank damage, turrets to attack with and the myriad of other modules available While some ships (such as the Drake) are capable of being set up to use absolutely no capacitor at all, the great majority of ships are reduced to the consistency of wet paper without it. Energy neutralisers consume a portion of your own capacitor and use it to neutralise a large portion of the enemy's capacitor. Because it uses a lot of your own capacitor, they aren't something you can put on just any ship as they would debilitate yourself almost as much as the enemy. The most effective use of energy neutralisers is to use a dedicated neutraliser ship which is fitted for very fast capacitor recharge or uses capacitor booster charges. Energy neutralisers work exceptionally well against all ships regardless of other EW already employed and are particularly effective against ships of a smaller size class than the size of neutraliser being used. For example, one cycle of a heavy energy neutraliser may not do too much to a battleship but it could cripple a cruiser and can kill a frigate's entire capacitor reserves in a single shot. Required skills Energy Emissions Systems - This skill reduces the capacitor usage of your energy neutralisers by 5% per level. Getting this to level 4 is essential for any neutralising ship as this is the only skill that directly affects energy neutralisers. Other important skills are those that increase your powergrid and augment your capacitor. Neutralising gear Unlike the other modules discussed in this part of the guide, nosferatu and energy neutralisers are subject to size constraints. There are three versions of each - small, medium and large. The large versions use so much powergrid that they will only fit on large ships like battleships or capital ships, medium versions are also able to fit on battlecruisers and cruisers and small versions will fit on frigates and destroyers. As you probably expect, the larger versions are more effective than the smaller, having both larger effect on the enemy and longer range. While Tech 2 modules tend to have fairly steady and reasonable prices due to the market pressures of invention, the best named versions of energy neutralisers and nosferatu are better than their tech 2 counterparts in that they require less powergrid and CPU but otherwise have identical stats. Because of this, the best named forms tend to be worth more than the Tech 2 versions. The best named versions of the nosferatu are the "Small/Medium/Heavy Diminishing Power System Drain I" and the best named versions of the energy neutraliser are the "Small/Medium/Heavy Unstable Power Fluctuator I". The best ships for Energy Neutralising are:
Common tactics Since nosferatu are not very effective at neutralising the enemy's capacitor, energy neutralisers will typically fill this role. In days gone by, it was common practice to use swarms of ships with nosferatu rather than a few dedicated neutralising ships. However, a change to how nosferatu work has prevented this from being effective - now a nosferatu will only drain capacitor from the enemy if you have a lower percentage capacitor than he does. Even though their effect in combat is devastating, it's often found that people engaging in gang warfare completely neglect the role of the dedicated neutraliser ship. These days, everyone wants to be dealing damage and nobody wants to replace his weapons with neutralisers. Despite people's reluctance to fill the role, a dedicated neutraliser ship remains a deadly addition to any high-security space gang. The most important tactic to remember with neutralisers is their use in crippling smaller ships. A battleship with a few heavy neutralisers can kill a frigate or cruiser's capacitor in one cycle over a distance of up to 25km. Enemy tacklers can be completely shut down and made unable to use their microwarpdrive for a fast escape, making them easy prey. The purpose of the energy neutraliser is to kill the enemy's capacitor completely, shutting down their tank and leaving them vulnerable to your damage-dealers. Enemies that continue to function despite neutralisers being run on them are probably using capacitor injectors to boost their capacitor back up after you knock it down. It's important to keep hitting them with the neutraliser as not only is their rate of injection limited by the capacitor injector's module duration but this will force the enemy to use up all of his charges and once that happens, he's dead in the water. Because neutralisers also take a portion of your own capacitor, it may be difficult to keep them running throughout the entire battle. One way to combat this is to use capacitor injectors to keep your capacitor level high and given the number you can carry in a ship's cargo hold, it's reasonable to assume that these will last for the duration of a single battle. Another way is to simply reduce the duration of the battle. When you expect that the enemy ships have been neutralised dry, it would be prudent for a neutraliser ship with little or no weaponry to evacuate the battlefield. Another important consideration is how efficiently you use your energy neutralisers. If you know roughly how much energy each of the enemy ships have, you can avoid wasting excess capacitor running a neutraliser on an empty target. The best way to judge this is to keep a rough mental estimate of the amount of capacitor each size of ship has, assuming level 4 in all skills. Since few ships use capacitor batteries in PvP where mid slots are better used for important modules like electronic warfare, sensor boosters or warp disruptors, this estimate is usually correct. The lazy man with a spare mid slot in his neutralising ship's setup can fit a ship scanner to get an actual readout of enemy capacitor levels. By cycling your neutralisers between enemy ships and stopping when they are empty, a single dedicated neutraliser battleship can cripple several of the enemy's important ships. 1.25 - Survival: As I said earlier, I'd like to touch on the subject of survival in the field of electronic warfare, with a particular view to gang warfare in high security space. As you've probably realised by now, ships that make the best use of electronic warfare are not the toughest ships in the game. They tend to have weak damage output and even weaker tanking potential and attempting to fit them to be survivable if attacked is very likely to damage your electronic warfare potential and spoil your performance in your given role. So if you can't fit hardeners and armour plates to keep yourself safe, what can you do? Safety in eve is 90% tactics and only 10% ship and fitting. Rather than fitting your ship for the eventuality of being attacked, you should be avoiding getting attacked as best you can. The best way to do this in high security space is to make sure no enemy gets close enough to warp scramble you and to warp out when you get in trouble. Warping out of the fight means you're not helping your fleet until you can warp back in but fortunately there are ways to prepare for this eventuality to reduce your time spent out of combat. If your enemy are often spotted in a certain solar system, you can prepare the battlefield to give yourself an advantage by making tactical bookmarks. Tactical bookmarks - These are bookmarks near locations where fights are likely to occur. For example, you can warp to a stargate and make a bookmark while in warp to it just before you arrive at it. Practice with this to produce a bookmark between 500km and 3000km from the stargate. When you get into trouble, warp to this bookmark instead of a nearby planet or station. Not only will the enemy be unable to follow you since he doesn't have your bookmark but you'll be able to turn around and warp right back into the fight in under a minute. Flying in the direction of your bookmark during the fight will keep you aligned to it, letting you warp instantly if you need to get out in a hurry. Getting back to the fight couldn't be simpler. Simply warp to the stargate or another gang member at whatever distance is desirable. More advanced pilots may want to make bookmarks on multiple sides of the gate, such as one 1000km above and one 1000km below, so that if small ships are speeding toward them in a battle, they can warp to the bookmark on the other side and get back to the fight on the opposite side of the friendly fleet. This lets you get far from the ship that was heading for you and if he wants to head for you again, he'll have to do a U-turn, making him a prime target for your gang's snipers. Self-defence: - Self-defence is an odd concept for an electronic warfare specialist but keep in mind that your electronic warfare modules can be much better than a sturdy tank at keeping you safe. Sensor dampening that sniper who's just locked you from 100km away could reduce his locking range enough to make him lose his lock on you. This is very difficult with tracking disruptors unless you can be sure that your enemy is only using turrets and your ship can orbit him closely. The best type of EW to defend yourself with would be ECM as any ship of any size can be jammed and smaller ships which could be speeding toward you to tackle you are much easier to jam. Counter-counter-measures - Now that you know just how effective electronic warfare can be, you should be preparing to defend against it. If you can employ electronic warfare to great effect, there's nothing stopping your enemy from doing the same. There are a number of ways to keep yourself safe from EW or counteract it and knowing these is arguably just as important as knowing the ins and outs of deploying electronic warfare on the battlefield. The first thing to realise is that just as in every other aspect of gang warfare, the best defence is a good offence. If you can cripple your enemy's electronic warfare specialist ships with your own, they can't engage your gang and will be of no use. There are of course ways to pre-emptively counter various forms of electronic warfare when you're fitting your ship out. To help prevent ECM jammers from working on you, fit an ECCM module and activate it when you go into battle. A good ECCM module will double your sensor strength, halving your chance of being jammed. If you're worried about your tracking speed or optimal range being messed with by a tracking disruptor, you could fit an extra tracking computer to compensate. Similarly, a sensor booster can increase your scan resolution or maximum targeting distance to counteract the effect of a sensor dampener. 1.26 - Specialisation - getting an edge: Aside from using tech 2 equipment and ships, there are plenty of ways to get an edge in high security gang warfare as an electronic warfare specialist. The most obvious choice is using rigs. There's an entire section of rigs specially designed for electronic warfare specialisation, the Electronic Superiority rigs. Most of these rigs are not prohibitively expensive to use on standard tech 1 cruisers and are quite cheap to use on recon ships compared to the cost of the ship itself. The most universally useful rig in the field is the Particle Dispersion Projector I, which increases the optimal range of ECM jammers, remote sensor dampeners and tracking disruptors by an impressive 20% at the expense of some shields. Maximising your optimal range allows you to operate at ranges outside your enemy's gang's effective range and to debilitate enemy sniping battleships. Each of the three main forms of electronic warfare (ECM jammers, remote sensor dampeners and tracking disruptors) has an associated rig to increase its strength. ECM jammers benefit from a 10% increase in strength with the ParticualDispersion Augmentor I rig, remote sensor dampeners make use of Inverted Signal Field Projector I for a 5% bonus to strength and tracking disruptors get a 5% bonus to their strength from the Tracking Diagnostic Subroutines I rig. Since these rigs and the optimal range rigs also have a stacking penalty, it's best not to use more than two of one type of rig. Tech 1 ships have three rig slots, meaning it's a good idea to use two of one type of rig and one of the other. Possibly the most important lesson you can bring away with you from this entire guide is that you can't buy victory. Victory doesn't have a price, it's not determined by who has the best ships and modules. The absolute best thing you can do to specialise and get an edge over your enemies is to practice a lot and gain real experience in combat. Perfecting the tactics mentioned in this guide and coming up with your own tactics based on your own experience is the real key to being an extremely effective electronic warfare specialist. There is absolutely no replacement for hard-earned combat experience. 1.27 - Hints and Tips: Splitting Electronic Warfare: One of the most important things to grasp as an electronic warfare specialist is knowing who to apply your EW to. When you engage the enemy, it's important that your fleet's electronic warfare be targeted on several of the enemy ships that they would be most effective on. It does no good to point all your gang's EW at the primary target, for example, as it should require only a fraction of your fleet's electronic warfare capabilities to neutralise one target. Additionally, some forms of EW such as sensor dampeners and tracking disruptors have a stacking penalty, meaning that using more than three on one target is not advised and adding a fourth will add negligible effect. There are some hard-and-fast rules on how to apply EW but the decisive factor in knowing where to target your electronic warfare is definitely experience, so get out there and test things out. There's no shame in losing a dozen cheaply fitted tech 1 EW cruisers if you learn a lot about how to apply your EW effectively. Some quick rules to remember include:
Combining Electronic Warfare: While splitting your Electronic Warfare up among the enemy ships is the general rule, there are cases where it's beneficial to combine multiple types against a single enemy. Probably the biggest case of this is using ECM jammers and Sensor Dampeners together. When sensor dampeners are fitted with the scan resolution script, they increase the time it takes the enemy to target your ships significantly. These make ECM jammers more effective because if a jam cycle fails, the enemy will be able to retarget your ships and the slower he can retarget, the better. The longer it takes him to target, the more cycles your ECM jammer will go through by the time he's finished acquiring his target and so the greater chance of keeping him permanently jammed. Another good combination for combating snipers is tracking disruptors with tracking speed scripts and sensor dampeners with targeting range scripts. This forces an enemy to get in closer if he wants to get a target lock but the decreased tracking speed makes it harder for him to track when in so close. This is only advisable against cruiser sized ships or above and is not advised against ships with short-range weaponry like blasters or autocannons. In closing... I do apologise for the length of time this part took to write, it was considerably longer than the first parts and I only really got the free time to get stuck into it around Easter. It is my hope that this part of the guide should serve as a basic yet thorough guide to the role of the electronic warfare specialist. This part particularly deals with general use and use in high-security gang warfare. Later when we're discussing low-security space and 0.0 warfare the roles of these ships and tactics used with them may change but the vast majority of the information in this section will still apply. It should be clear by now that adding some electronic warfare specialists to your gang will allow you to hit much larger enemy gangs than before and succeed with a good battle plan and gang structure. Perhaps next time your corporation is taking a picnic in their enemy's back yard, you might prefer to put your damage-dealing ship back in the mothballs and take an electronic warfare specialist ship out for a spin :). In part 1.3, I will discuss the role of the damage-dealer with a bias toward high-security gang warfare. -- Nyphur |
