Saturday, March 28, 2009

Ultimate Sniper BattleShip - Megathron

The Megathron not only looks cool, but it was built for long range operations known as BS Sniper.

What makes the Megathron such a good sniper Battleship?

Many things, namely it's bonuses. Each BS level trained gives you 5% bonus to Large Hybrid Turret damage and 7.5% bonus to Large Hybrid Turret tracking speed. The tracking bonus is what makes the Megathron such a lethal sniper. The extra damage per level a plus as well. But, tracking at long range, is vital when insta-popping fast moving frigates and other fast ships at 160km+ range!

The only weakness, in the design of the ship, is that the Megathron only has 4x mid slots. So, the tracking bonus (effectively 2 and 1/2 Tracking Computers 'builtin' at BS level 5) negates the Mid Slot crisis, because now one can use them for Sensor Boosting the ship.

All sniper Battleship fits require Sensor Boosting, both for Optimal Gun Range and Targeting Range. With only 4x mid slots to work with, the Mega has just enough slots it needs to be an effective sniper BS. So, fitting 2x Sensor Booster II's with a targeting script in at least one of the Boosters, along with a Tracking Computer with an Optimal Range Script for the Guns, leaving only one Mid slot left, typically used to fit a MicroWarp Drive.

What the Megathron lacks in mid slots, it makes up for in it's 8x High and 7x Low slots.

With the full array of High slots (8), this allows you to fit up to 7x 425mm Railguns and 1x Remote Armor Repairer or 6x Guns and 2x Cruise Missile Launchers. Or 6 guns, 1 repper and maybe a Smartbomb or Missile Launcher. Even a cloaking device can be fitted. This makes the Megathron primarily a Railgun boat, but also a decent Missile boat. If you do not like missiles, which Gallente usually do not focus on, the 1-2x remaining High slots allow for a wide range of uses, depending on your playing style or Gang/Fleet requirements.

With the abundance of Low slots, it is easy to heavily Armor Tank the Megathron. With 2-3x 1600mm Plates fitted, you are still left with 4-5x slots for fitting damage multipliers, armor resists and a Damage Control II module. Usually, fitting a local Armor Repper is not done, simply because armor reppers use too much power grid, which the Railguns consume. So, a tactic known as 'spider tanking' is used, where you rely on each other, in your BS Sniper gang, to remote repair you, using those spare High Slots.

Speaking of armor tanking, many pilots like to Rig the ship with 3x Trimarks. (Although a Trimark Rig will cost you 18-22 million ISK each), easily giving your Megathron a large enough Hit Point buffer to survive even a Dooms Day attack. (A single DD will inflict 30,000 damage points).

Since, this is a Gallente ship, the Megathron is capable of fielding 5x Heavy Drones, such as the popular Ogre II's. Yes, this brillant ship has 125 m3 Drone space with 125 drone bandwidth! Instead of Heavy Drones, what any smart MegaSniper pod pilot will do, is load 10x Medium Combat Drones and 10x Light Drones, such as the popular Hammerhead II's and Warrior II's for Anti-Cruiser and Anti-Frigate capablity. Since, this ship will not be able to hit fast moving targets that get too close, the large drone bay gives the Megathron the ability to defend itself, if attacked close range. One of the biggest threats to a Battleship snipping Gang is, believe it or not, one of the smallest ships. Interceptors are extremely fast capable of MWDing their way close enough to your gang, allowing the enemy to warp to the Interceptor and in range of your long range sniper Fleet! Warrior II's can make short work of small ships!

Megathron Snipper Fit

Highs
7x 425mm Railgun II or Compressed Coil
1x Medium Armor Repairer I

Mediums
1x 100mn Microwarp Drive
1x Tracking Computer II (optimal script)
2x Sensor Booster II (targeting range script in one of them, the other left empty)

Lows
2x 1600mm Rolled Tungsten Armor Plates I
1x Capacitor Power Relay II
2x Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
1x Damage Control II
1x Adaptive Nano Membrane II (No cpu needed)

Optional Rigs
3x Trimark I
or
1x CCC, 2x Trimarks

Drones
5x HammerHead II
15x Warrior II

Ammo
Antimatter L
Lead L
Spike L (Tech II)
Javelin L (Tech II)

Platinum Insurance

With the combination of the Tracking and Damage bonuses, a versitle High slot turret and launcher mount points, just enough mid slots, almost a full array of low slots (7) and a large drone bay, makes this ship destined for it's role as a sniper.

But, in order to become trained in the Snipping business, requires Tech 2 everything. Without Tech 2 Railguns, Sensor Boosters and an Optimal Tracking Computer, you will simply not be able to hit much further out than 120km, or so. You need Tech 2, and this means a lot of skill training.

Long Range Targeting 4 (Sensor booster II)
Trajectory Analysis 4 (Tracking Computer II)
Large Railgun Specialization (at least to level 1)
Gallente Battleship (at least to level 4)
Weapon Upgrades 5
Advanced Weapon Upgrades (at least to level 4)

The weapon upgrade skills reduce CPU and Power Grid of the Railguns, which is required, if you want to fit as many as possible, and have just enough CPU and Grid for the rest.

TIP: If you can not fit Tech II Railguns, it is still possible to hit at 160km, but it will take 2 of your low slots away. Simply, fit 2x Tracking Enhancer II's and use Lead ammo charges in your 425mm Railguns. Make sure to buy Compressed Coil named Railguns, as they use less CPU, more importantly, give greater Optimal Range! In a mid slot, fit a Tracking Computer II, loaded with an Optimal Range Script. This will give you just enough range, to keep up until you train Tech II Rails and Advanced Weapon Upgrades.

4 comments:

  1. "sniPer", 1 P.

    Duh.

    ReplyDelete
  2. hmmm do you have any other bs fitting guides as ive just got my shinny new mega and not quite shure how to set it up.

    thanks

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi Matt,

    Thanks for taking the time to put this together. It was easy to read and informative. I have been getting interested in soloing level 4 agent missions and going into class 2-3 wormholes. I want to get strong enough to solo all of that. I was just thinking today i need to get started on tech II's so I am glad to have found your blog, thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  4. If you want to do wormholes, you need a HAC at least and only up to Class 2 I believe. Getting a Tengu will allow you to do up to Class 3 solo...just barely.

    I have read you can do Class 6 with only 4 Tengu with the Remote rep subsys.

    ReplyDelete