[Jester's Trek] FOTW: Bellicose frigate shredder
FOTW: Bellicose frigate shredder
I've done a Bellicose fairly recently when cruisers were rebalanced, but that one was intended to attack targets of equal or larger size. But the "Bell" is equally adept at going after smaller targets and happily I'm seeing them used in this way more and more often:
[Bellicose, Frigate Shredder]
Pseudoelectron Containment Field I
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Experimental 10MN Microwarpdrive I
Faint Warp Disruptor I
Phased Weapon Navigation Array Generation Extron
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Large Shield Extender II
Rapid Light Missile Launcher II, Inferno Fury Light Missile
Rapid Light Missile Launcher II, Inferno Fury Light Missile
Rapid Light Missile Launcher II, Inferno Fury Light Missile
Rapid Light Missile Launcher II, Inferno Fury Light Missile
Medium Core Defense Field Extender I
Medium Core Defense Field Extender I
Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Valkyrie II x3
Hobgoblin II x2
The Bell HAM fit was intended to be mobile and quick. This one's intended to be tougher. You're certainly not going to be able to catch or outrun a frigate that doesn't want to be caught. As a result, this fit is turned more toward being able to hang on in the face of a small frigate swarm, particularly under reps. The last rig closes the EM hole that a lot of frigs will want to try to exploit, and the nano from the HAM fit is converted to more damage for this one.
The trick to flying this ship is a lot of overheating of pretty much everything you can overheat. In particular, heat up the weapons before you fire them; RLMLs are quick firing and quick to empty and have a long reload so it will be quite tough to overheat them into uselessness. As a result, you may as well get all the DPS you can out of them. A non-heated Target Painter will let you do full damage against virtually any frigate platform but if you find yourself fighting after-burning frigates, go ahead and overheat that, too. That will push your damage close to 350 against anything except long-range Crows and Talwars which are the weakness of this class.
That much anti-frigate damage will absolutely melt most tacklers. I've watched it happen. It's not pretty when it's happening to a friend, quite amusing when it's happening to an enemy.
Trade the heavier, slower drone load-out of the HAM Bell for Valks and Hobs which will reach many targets at about the same time. If you're going to go full anti-frig, you can go for a full flight of Hobs or Warriors instead and use the last 15m3 of drone bay for something else.
In a fight, overheat your MWD and your Invul; as always, I have the mods on this fit shown in the order that makes sense and is "pretty." For the actual ship the correct order is MWD-LSE-TP-Invul-Point. Set that way, you can overheat for close to three minutes and your non-bonused EHP is around 25k, not bad at all for a shield ship and again, pretty good under reps.
The best way to use these ships is in a pack. The major disadvantage to RLML platforms is that long reload time. Using a group of these ships spreads out the reload timers as they clear tackle away from the rest of the fleet. You can go for a small group of these as a screening force but for maximum amusement, do a fleet of half these plus half close-up tackle, plus a Scythe or two.
Crash booster is this ship's best friend, followed very closely by Mindflood. Besides the reload timer, the disadvantage to pretty much any T1 cruiser is anemic capacitor recharge and the Mindflood will help with that.
Brave Newbies are headed to Curse and those guys love flocks of Atrons as their tackle ships, supplemented by assault frigs and interceptors. A few frigate-shredding Bells will go through that like the proverbial hot knife through butter, leaving their heavier DPS ships either exposed or unable to effectively apply tackle to their targets.
Have fun. :-)
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: FOTW: Bellicose frigate shredder