Minmatar Basic Ship and Skill Overview

This guide provides general information and recommendations for T1 ships of a single player faction.

For more advanced and in-depth information on specific ships refer to EVE ships. This guide simply gathers the characteristics and overview of racial lineups in an easy to browse format for the very new player.

Basic Ship and Skill Overviews -- Amarr | Caldari | Gallente | Minmatar | ORE | Pirate

Rookie Ship

The rookie ship is the first ship you start with. If you are Minmatar, it will be a Reaper. A new rookie ship is given whenever you dock at a station where you do not have any ships.

Frigate

Frigates are the smallest of the ship classes in EVE. They are used mostly for level 1 missions or for tackling and electronic warfare roles in PvP.

Destroyer

Destroyers are slightly larger and have more highslots than frigates but fit the same small-sized weapons. They're designed to slaughter frigates but be vulnerable to most other ships. They are often used in PvE for Level 1 missions, and as salvage ships.

Flying destroyers is not recommended for PvP Uni fleets. There are some exceptions, such as specialized hit & run fleets.

Battlecruisers

When you begin to fly Minmatar battlecruisers it is a good idea to be training towards a Shield or Armor Full T2 Tank. (You will need a full T2 tank to fly battlecruisers in wartime PvP, if you're a uni pilot; whether or not you're in the uni, a T2 tank is helpful in PvE.) It is also wise to have basic Gunnery Support skills sorted out, and to be training towards T2 light and medium drones.

Battleships

When you step into a battleship it's important to have solid support skills. A T2 tank is extremely helpful (and required to fly BSs in wartime Uni PvP fleets), while access to T2 light and medium drones will be useful, as they will be your main defence against targets too small for your large weapons.

Ammunition, Range, and Kiting

You can read a detailed description of projectile turret ammunition here. Minmatar ships have the ability to control the type of damage they deal and therefore target their enemy's weaknesses. In PvE you can look up the damage type your enemy is weak to here and select the appropriate ammunition.

By default, close range (EMP, Fusion or Phased Plasma) ammo should be used for the best DPS. There is no close-range projectile ammo which does primarily kinetic damage, but the higher DPS of the short-ranged projectile ammunition types may compensate for this if you target their second-weakest resist. If you are taking too much damage at close range, switch to medium range (Titanium Sabot or Depleted Uranium) or long (Proton, Nuclear or Carbonized Lead) range ammo and fire from further away. See the dedicated Projectile Ammunition page for more advice.

Guns can suffer from tracking issues, so I would recommend using the 'keep at range' option instead of the 'orbit' option. With the amount of enemies in missions, orbiting is less likely to mitigate the total incoming damage from rats.

Projectile turrets are unusual in having very long falloff. This means that keeping within optimal range is not as essential for you as it is for pilots using lasers and hybrids. Autocannon have such short optimal ranges that you are more or less condemned to fight in falloff with them; with artillery you should probably aim to be at the edge of your optimal range. There's no need to be closer than that, and the more range you can keep at the less trouble your guns will have tracking the enemy.

To find out your optimal and falloff ranges with ammo, load ammo in your guns, then right click and show info. The optimal displayed in the attributes will be adjusted for ammo and skills.

Tech and Meta Levels

These fittings were made mostly using Tech 1 Meta 0 modules for frigates and cruisers, and meta 4 and Tech 2 for larger ships. In PvP, frigates and cruisers are often not worth fitting expensive modules on for low skill point or inexperienced pilots. Tech 1 Meta 0 modules are provided freely by the university. Once pilots have the skill points, a certain amount of combat experience, and enough ISK to replace bigger ships, they should consider moving to a battlecruiser wit T2 fittings.

Pilots without T2 guns fitting a BC for PvP should probably avoid the overpriced meta 3 and 4 guns. Some of the meta 3 and 4 medium guns are reasonably priced, but many are not, and will only make your ship into a loot Piñata for the enemy when it is destroyed, for very little increase in effective dps. It is strongly recommended to get T2 guns before getting into BC, BS, or any T2 damage dealing ships.

Higher Meta items up to meta 4 will often be easier to fit. Tech 2 is Meta 5, and usually harder to fit. Meta 3 and 4 are expensive, often more expensive than Tech 2. Meta 1 and 2 modules will often be less expensive than Meta 0, due to low demand and high supply on the market.

Drones

Small drones should be used against frigate and destroyer sized enemies, medium drones should be used against cruiser and battlecruiser sized enemies, and heavy drones should be used against battleship sized enemies.

Avoid Amarr drones: due to their low damage multiplier, they are useless even against enemies who's lowest resistance is EM damage. Gallente drones have the highest damage multiplier, and thermal damage is the best or second best damage to deal against most rat types. For level 1 to 3 missions, Gallente drones are fine to use exclusively, although switching drones will make more efficient runs. In level 4 missions, it is strongly recommended to always fit the best drone types to match rat weaknesses.

See Drones and Using Drones for more advice on drone selection and deployment.

Tank & Gank

Different rat (NPC pirates) factions have different damage type resistances, and deal different damage types.

Drones and hardeners should be switched around based on rat types.

Damage type resistance and dealt by rats can be found in the NPC Damage Types article.

Mission-specific damage profiles can be found on Eve Survival.

All EHP in this guide is from EFT calculations, not in-game EHP.

Salvaging After Missions

Salvaging boats, most commonly destroyers, are usually used to clean up rooms after missions are complete. To do so, make sure you bookmark one wreck for each room in the mission, since the acceleration gates will disappear after the mission has be turned in at the agent. Once the mission is turned in, the MWD can be used to propel the salvaging boat within tractor range faster.

For Level 4 missions, many players switch from a destroyer to a Notics because they have bonuses to tractor beams range and salvager cycle time. The Hurricane is still a popular salvaging ship for wormholes because it is fast and agile (for a BC), and can fit a resonable tank, has eight high slots for salvagers and tractor beams and six low slots for expanded cargohold modules (which aren't subject to stacking penalties).

Related Links

• Basic skills and Support skills - Training support skills is a key step towards flying a ship well. Read up on support skills here.
• Fitting Guidelines - Some general guidelines for fitting ships.
• Fitting Modules and Rigs Guide - A list of rigs and module types with short descriptions.
• NPC damage types and NPC Ship Attributes - To see which resists to use and damage types to deal against NPC rats.
• Creating an Alt Hauler - Having an alt hauler can be useful for shopping trips during wartime, if you are living in highsec.

Ship Skill and Fitting Overviews -- Amarr | Caldari | Gallente | Minmatar | ORE | Pirate Factions