[Jester's Trek] Fit of the Week: Alpha Talwar
Fit of the Week: Alpha Talwar
It's pretty easy to forget that missile ships can be volley ships, too. So many of us get so focused on gun volley damage that we overlook a ridiculous little ship like this one:
[Talwar, Alpha Shield Buffer]
Pseudoelectron Containment Field I
Micro Auxiliary Power Core II
Ballistic Control System II
Limited 1MN Microwarpdrive I
Medium F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Sensor Booster II, Targeting Range Script
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Experimental TE-2100 Light Missile Launcher, Caldari Navy Nova Light Missile
Small Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Small Core Defense Field Extender I
Small Hydraulic Bay Thrusters I
First things first: because this is a tight fit, this is an old character's play-thing. Brave Newbies like Talwars but they mostly like them because lots of cheap meta1 mods can be fitted to them with even cheaper rigs. You throw in a small pile of Nova Missiles (faction or otherwise) and when a bunch of them get firing, suddenly you have some 1200 volley damage Per Talwar. Short version, 50 or 60 of these means that you have sufficient volley on field to alpha through even relatively tough targets like HACs and battle cruisers. The DPS is even pretty reasonable, at 120 to 150 depending strongly on player skill and the exact meta of light missile launchers chosen. Don't choose particularly expensive launcher.s It's unlikely you'll live to bring them home.
The only difference between this ship and the Brave Newbies version is that this one tanks better... whereas a Brave Newbies Talwar dies to a single bombing run. They don't care; they're not proud.
After the missile launchers, damage assist mod and MWD, the next most important module is at least one rig improving missile flight time or speed, maybe even two of them. This is not a brawling ship. It has the sig radius of a small cruiser and the EHP of a frigate. It's not a good combination and it should try to stay out of range of damage, particularly HAC damage which can absolutely eat this kind of ship. The missile flight time rig combined with a Sensor Booster allows the ship to shoot missiles almost to the extent of its 72km lock range. Not many HACs can effectively counter-punch at that range.
After that, I've filled in with a MWD and the remainder of a tank, most particularly Medium Shield Extender and a T2 MAPC so that I can fit both it and the MWD. As implied above, this is the ultimate skirmishing ship; it should be fighting in the 45-50km range. There's no point fitted because the last thing this ship should be doing is tackling things. Therefore, a Talwar fitted this way is highly reliant on either close-range tackle, bubbles in null-sec, or -- daringly -- no tackle at all. With each Talwar doing 1200 alpha and enough of these little monsters on the field, your enemy might not realize that he's going to start losing ships until it's too late. This will take a small bit of timing on the part of your FC since like all volley damage, it's better if the volleys arrive together to minimize the likelihood of enemy logi undoing your good work.
That, incidentally, makes this Talwar remarkably easy for beginners to fly: skirmish away from your targets, lock the ones your FC tells you to, fire when you're told to do so. It couldn't be much more straight-forward.
Finally, there isn't much point to carrying other types of missiles. The Talwar gets a significant explosive damage bonus. Still, if you want to carry one reload of faction Mjolnirs, I won't stop you. Shield ships are traditionally pretty well-tanked against explosive damage and you might want to try the alternative.
Happy missile launching!
All Fits of the Week are intended as general guidelines only. You may not have the skills needed for this exact fit. If you do not, feel free to adjust the fit to suit to meet your skills, including using meta 3 guns and "best named" defenses and e-war. Ships can also be adjusted to use faction or dead-space modules depending on the budget of the pilot flying it. Each FOTW is intended as a general guide to introduce you to concepts that will help you fit and to fly that particular type of ship more aggressively and well.
Source: Fit of the Week: Alpha Talwar