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| To avoid finding yourself floating in your pod you need to be able to tank the damage. This is generally achieved through three ways: | | To avoid finding yourself floating in your pod you need to be able to tank the damage. This is generally achieved through three ways: |
| * Increase ship raw HP. Generally known as passive tanking. | | * Increase ship raw HP. Generally known as buffer tanking or passive tanking. |
| * Repair damage received. Known as active tanking. | | * Repair damage received. Known as active tanking. |
| * Increase damage resists. Used to increase effectiveness of both passive and active tanking. | | * Increase damage resists. Used to increase effectiveness of both passive and active tanking. |
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| | == Passive tanking == |
| | The buffer tank is based around the principle of having high damage resistance and as many hit points as possible, thus increasing the Effective HitPoints (EHP) of the ship. The concept behind this is simple, add enough EHP to your ship to outlast your opponent through the use of active and/or passive resistance modules, which complement the Armor Plate modules that add raw hit points. |
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| | This type of fitting uses a minimal amount of capacitor to run hardeners making it easily sustainable, but can be made fully passive by using only passive resistance modules instead. The primary drawback to Buffer Tanking is that you have no way to repair yourself, so when you run out of hit points you are toast. |
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| | Most common in fleet PvP, but also group PvE with logistic support (like incursions, wormhole anomalies / signatures and a few others). In PvP a fleet will overwhelm an active tank in fairly short order, whereas a buffer tank will give you more survival time. Although, some ships with faction gear and active tank bonuses can field some extremely resistant active tanks that can take on more than you might think. |
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| | In general if you are expecting to have Logistical support (friends to rep your armor) then you want to buffer tank more towards resistance, because the higher your resistances the more effective logistic reps are. While if you don't expect logistical support you only care about the Effective Hit Points, so whatever combination gives you more effective hit points is the best option. |
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| | == Active tanking== |
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| | Active tanking is most commonly used for solo activities such as mission/complex running, ratting, and solo PvP. Active Tanking differs from Buffer Tanking in that it uses Armor Repair or shield booster modules to actively repair damage done to the ship. You should be careful to include enough resistance and buffer to keep your repair modules from being overwhelmed by incoming damage; frequently this means packing resistance modules (either passive or active) that compensate for the specific types of damage you expect to be receiving. |
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| | This type of fitting takes a lot of capacitor to sustain your cap-hungry repair modules so it should ideally include modules such as Cap Rechargers and/or Capacitor Batteries to balance out and maintain capacitor stability. |
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| | Capacitor stability is important because it allows you to leave your Tank modules turned on without ever worrying about running out of capacitor. So long as incoming damage is less than what your repair modules can handle your ship should be able to sustain that level of damage indefinitely. This is commonly referred to as Perma-tanking. If incoming damage exceeds your repair capacity you will gradually run out of Hit Points and die. This is commonly referred to as breaking the tank. |
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| | For PvP purposes a Cap Booster can be used to temporarily supplement capacitor output to allow for short bursts of heavy tanking. The primary drawback to this approach is that unlike the capacitor stable fitting described above, when you run out of charges to run your Capacitor Booster, you quickly run out of capacitor, your tank will fail and you will die horribly. |
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| | Similarly, weapon systems that drain your ship's capacitor will effectively disable your active tanking modules. As above, your tank will fail and you will die horribly. In this case, the Capacitor Booster can be used on an otherwise capacitor stable fitting to provide emergency power to prevent being drained and destroyed. |
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| ===Resists=== | | ===Resists=== |
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| ===Armor tanking=== | | ===Armor tanking=== |
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| | Armor tanking emphasizes the use of the low slot modules described in the previous section to increase armor hit points, resistance to damage and repair damage done to it. Regardless of the approach taken to armor tanking, it is wise to understand that armor has an inherent weakness to explosive damage and plan your resistance modules accordingly. |
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| Armor Tanking: Focuses on maximizing strength and effectiveness of your armor to withstand and/or repair damage. This is the most common type of defense for ships with a greater number of low-slots, where most armor-related modules are fitted. | | Armor Tanking: Focuses on maximizing strength and effectiveness of your armor to withstand and/or repair damage. This is the most common type of defense for ships with a greater number of low-slots, where most armor-related modules are fitted. |
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| ** Come in energized and non-energized variants. The energized ones require same CPU as energized resist membranes while the non-energized requires only 1 PG. | | ** Come in energized and non-energized variants. The energized ones require same CPU as energized resist membranes while the non-energized requires only 1 PG. |
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| === Remote Armor Repair Systems ===
| | * Remote Armor Repair Systems |
| *Remote repair modules repair armor on other pilots' ships. Note that you must target the ship to be repaired, and that your cannot repair your own ship with a remote repper. They are more useful in fleet operations than regular reppers, for a couple of reasons. First, one repper can repair many ships, given time. Second, the repper cycles more quickly than an onboard repper does. Third, if several ships have them, they can focus their repair power on whatever ship in the fleet is being attacked, giving that ship a great deal of armor repair capability. This is known as [[Spider Tanking]]. The problem with using the remote repair modules on non logi ships is the range, all the ships need to remain in a small area. | | ** Remote armor repairers consume significant ammount og capacitor to remotely repair armor on single target. |
| *Note that remote repair modules take a significant amount of capacitor to run -- non-logistics ships will probably need a cap booster module to use it for any length of time.
| | ** The repair again happens at the end of the cycle. This can make it hard to repair targets if they die before the repair lands. |
| | | ** Long optimal range, short falloff range. As a result the effectiveness drops rapidly if the target is beyond optimal range. |
| Rigs
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| There are a few commonly used [[Rig#Armor|armor rigs]]:
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| *Trimark Armor Pump -- The Tech I version gives a 15% boost to total armor, at the cost of some ship speed. It's the rig equivalent of the Armor Layering Membrane. Trimark rigs are not stacking penalised (armor HP is never stacking penalised). They apply after any fixed HP bonus from armor plates. Incurs a 10% penalty to maximum speed. | | * Rigs |
| *There are also damage-specific resistance improvement rigs. The most commonly used is the Anti-Explosive Pump, since armor tanks are generally weakest to explosive damage. Armor resist rigs are stacking penalized with; Armor Hardners, Energized Planing and Resistance Plating modules. Armor resist rigs penalize speed by 10%. | | ** Trimark Armor Pump increases the raw HP by a percentage. Reduces maximum speed. |
| *Auxiliary Nano Pump -- Increases a ship's armor repairer repair amount per cycle by 15% at the expense of increased power grid use for local armor reps. Suffers from stacking penalties if you fit more than one. | | ** Anti-damage type rigs increase damage resist to single damage type. Reduce maximum speed. |
| *Nanobot Accelerator -- This rig speeds up armor repair module cycle times by 15%, again at the cost of power grid use. In theory this is more effective for active armor tanks than the Auxiliary Nano Pump, but because it also causes you to use a lot more capacitor, it is used less often. Despite what the description says, it doesn't suffers from stacking penalties if you fit more than one. | | ** Auxiliary Nano Pump increases a ship's armor repairer repair amount per cycle. Increases the power grid use for local armor reps. |
| | *Nanobot Accelerator speeds up armor repair module cycle times by. Again at the cost of power grid use. In theory this is more effective for active armor tanks than the Auxiliary Nano Pump, but note that shorter cycle time also results in higher capacitor use. |
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| Implants
| | * Implants |
| *There are several useful implants that focus on armor tank improvement, all from the Inherent Implants "Noble" series: | |
| **Repair Systems RS-6xx series - Slot 6 - reduces armor and hull repair systems duration by 1% to 6%, depending on model number | | **Repair Systems RS-6xx series - Slot 6 - reduces armor and hull repair systems duration by 1% to 6%, depending on model number |
| **Remote Repair Sustems RA-7xx series - Slot 7 - reduces capacitor need for remote armor repair modules by 1% to 6%, depending on model number | | **Remote Repair Sustems RA-7xx series - Slot 7 - reduces capacitor need for remote armor repair modules by 1% to 6%, depending on model number |
| **Repair Proficiency RP-9xx series - Slot 9 - increases armor repair system amount by 1% to 6%, depending on model number | | **Repair Proficiency RP-9xx series - Slot 9 - increases armor repair system amount by 1% to 6%, depending on model number |
| **Hull Upgrades HP-10xx series - Slot 10 increases armor hit points by 1% to 6%, depending on model number | | **Hull Upgrades HP-10xx series - Slot 10 increases armor hit points by 1% to 6%, depending on model number |
| | ** There is also the incredible Slave set of pirate implants. |
| | *** This is a series of implants that fit into slots 1-6. Each provides a bonus to armor hit points, but when you fit the entire set, it provides a multiplicative total bonus of 53.63%. Unfortunately, a complete Slave set cost about 1.8 billion ISK or more. |
| | *** There is a less expensive low-grade Slave set, which provides an aggregate bonus of 33.83% to armor hit points. These are a relative bargain at only 750 million ISK or so. |
| | *** You can mix & match HG and LG Slave implants, for a final armor HP bonus partway in between. |
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| *There is also the incredible Slave set of pirate implants. | | ==== Armor Tanking Skills ==== |
| **This is a series of implants that fit into slots 1-6. Each provides a bonus to armor hit points, but when you fit the entire set, it provides a multiplicative total bonus of 53.63%. Unfortunately, a complete Slave set cost about 1.8 billion ISK or more. | | *{{sk|Hull Upgrades}} |
| **There is a less expensive low-grade Slave set, which provides an aggregate bonus of 33.83% to armor hit points. These are a relative bargain at only 750 million ISK or so. | | ** 5% armor HP per level |
| **You can mix & match HG and LG Slave implants, for a final armor HP bonus partway in between. | | ** Required for armor plates, hardeners, membranes and resist plates. |
| | | *{{sk|Mechanics}} |
| *You can also get some officer-fit implants, that are variations of existing implant series except more effective. Once example is Akemon's Modified 'Noble' ZET5000 implant, which is an 8% version of the Hull Upgrades HP-10xx series of implants. It's correspondingly more expensive as well. | | ** 5% hull HP per level |
| | ** Reqruired for armor repairers |
| | *{{sk|Repair Systems}} |
| | ** 5% reduction in armor repair module cycle duration. It should be noted that a reduction in activation time increase the capacitor need of the module. |
| | ** Required for armor repairers |
| | * {{sk|EM Armor Compensation}} |
| | ** 5% increase per level in EM resist for membranes and resist plates |
| | * {{sk|TH Armor Compensation}} |
| | ** 5% increase per level in TH resist for membranes and resist plates |
| | * {{sk|KIN Armor Compensation}} |
| | ** 5% increase per level in KIN resist for membranes and resist plates |
| | * {{sk|EX Armor Compensation}} |
| | ** 5% increase per level in EX resist for membranes and resist plates |
| | * {sk|Armor Rigging}} |
| | ** Reduces the drawbacks of armor rigs by 10% per level. |
| | * {{sk|ARmor Layering}} |
| | ** 5% redution in mass penalty of armor plates per level. |
| | * {{sk|Armor Resistance Phasing}} |
| | ** 10% reduction in cycle time and capacitor usage of reactive armor hardener per level. |
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| Spider Tanking: Focuses on a fleet tactic in which ships mount remote armor repair modules so they can repair each other. | | Spider Tanking: Focuses on a fleet tactic in which ships mount remote armor repair modules so they can repair each other. |
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| | === Spider Tanking === |
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| | In simple terms, Spider tanking involves the use of a Buffer and/or highly resistant tank that is repaired remotely by other ships in your squad who are in turn repaired by remote repair modules on your ship. This is an advanced technique that requires a good deal of coordination to function effectively. |
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| == Armor Tanking Strategies ==
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| Armor tanking emphasizes the use of the low slot modules described in the previous section to increase armor hit points, resistance to damage and repair damage done to it. Regardless of the approach taken to armor tanking, it is wise to understand that armor has an inherent weakness to explosive damage and plan your resistance modules accordingly.
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| There are two primary approaches to Armor tanking:
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| *'''Buffer tanking'''
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| *'''Active tanking'''
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| *Note:'''Passive tanking''' doesn't exist in the same sense as in shield tanking, since armor doesn't repair itself.
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| === Buffer tanking ===
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| *Typically used for PvP, the buffer tank is based around the principle of having high damage resistance and as many hit points as possible, thus increasing the Effective HitPoints (EHP) of the ship. The concept behind this is simple, add enough EHP to your ship to outlast your opponent through the use of active and/or passive resistance modules, which complement the Armor Plate modules that add raw hit points.
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| *Ideally this should free up enough fitting slots, CPU and power grid to fit bigger weapons and more combat utility modules, such as tackling equipment, to maximize your damage output. This type of fitting uses a minimal amount of capacitor to run Armor Hardeners making it easily sustainable, but can be made fully passive by using only passive resistance modules instead. The primary drawback to Buffer Tanking is that you have no way to repair yourself, so when you run out of hit points you are toast.
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| *Most common in fleet PvP, but also group PvE (like incursions, wormhole anomalies / signatures and a few others). In PvP a fleet will overwhelm an active tank in fairly short order, whereas a buffer tank will give you more survival time. Although, some ships with faction gear and active tank bonuses can field some extremely resistant active tanks that can take on more than you might think. In general if you are expecting to have Logistical support (friends to rep your armor) then you want to buffer tank more towards resistance, because the higher your resistances the more effective logistic reps are. While if you don't expect logistical support you only care about the Effective Hit Points, so whatever combination gives you more effective hit points is the best option.
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| === Active Tanking ===
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| *Active tanking is most commonly used for solo activities such as mission/complex running, ratting, and solo PvP. Active Tanking differs from Buffer Tanking in that it uses Armor Repair modules to actively repair damage done to the ship. You should be careful to include enough resistance and buffer to keep your repair modules from being overwhelmed by incoming damage; frequently this means packing resistance modules (either passive or active) that compensate for the specific types of damage you expect to be receiving.
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| *This type of fitting takes a lot of capacitor to sustain your cap-hungry Armor Repair modules so it should ideally include modules such as Cap Rechargers and/or Capacitor Batteries to balance out and maintain capacitor stability.
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| *Capacitor stability is important because it allows you to leave your Tank modules turned on without ever worrying about running out of capacitor. So long as incoming damage is less than what your repair modules can handle your ship should be able to sustain that level of damage indefinitely. This is commonly referred to as Perma-tanking. If incoming damage exceeds your repair capacity you will gradually run out of Hit Points and die. This is commonly referred to as having a broken tank.
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| *For PvP purposes a Cap Booster can be used to temporarily supplement capacitor output to allow for short bursts of heavy tanking. The primary drawback to this approach is that unlike the capacitor stable fitting described above, when you run out of charges to run your Capacitor Booster, you quickly run out of capacitor, your tank will fail and you will die horribly.
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| *Similarly, weapon systems that drain your ship's capacitor will effectively disable your active tanking modules. As above, your tank will fail and you will die horribly. In this case, the Capacitor Booster can be used on an otherwise capacitor stable fitting to provide emergency power to prevent being drained and destroyed.
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| === Spider Tanking (Armor) ===
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| *In simple terms, Spider tanking involves the use of a Buffer and/or highly resistant tank that is repaired remotely by other ships in your squad who are in turn repaired by remote repair modules on your ship. This is an advanced technique that requires a good deal of coordination to function effectively, and will be covered later in this guide.
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| === Fitting Strategy ===
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| *Whether fitting active or buffer tanking it is advisable to use some sort of fitting tool, such as EFT or Pyfa, to create and compare fits:
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| **For PvP, fit the largest single plate you can, and then play around with '''Armor Hardeners''', '''Energized Plating''', '''Resistance Plating''' to get the most Effective Hit Points that you can get.
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| **For PvE, fit one or two repair modules (depending on how much cap you have available), and then fit as many armor damage resistance modules of the appropriate damage types for the expected enemy.
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| == Armor Tanking Skill Summary ==
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| The following skills are required to field a full Tech 2 Armor tank:
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| *{{sk|Hull Upgrades}} V: To fit Tech 2 Resistance and Plate modules and maximize Armor hit points
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| *{{sk|Mechanics}} V: to fit Tech 2 Armor Repairers and maximize your structure hit points
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| *{{sk|Repair Systems}} IV: to fit Tech 2 Armor Repairers
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| *The primary armor tanking skill is [[Skills:Armor#Hull_Upgrades|Hull Upgrades]], which grants a 5% bonus to armor hit points per skill level. Hull Upgrades V is the prerequisite for the most useful Tech II armor resistance modules.
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| *[[Skills:Armor#Mechanics|Mechanics]] is also required to fit armor repairers, and should be trained up to level V to fit Tech II equipment and operate it effectively. Mechanics also provides a 5% bonus to structure hit points per skill level.
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| *Training the four armor-compensation skills is also important, since most of the commonly-used armor hardener modules will benefit significantly from them. These skills increase resistance to specific types of damage by 5% per skill level for passive armor hardeners, before Retribution 1.1 these skills also helped active modules but this is no longer the case. For regular armor tankers, each of these skills should be trained to at least level III or higher, IV is highly recommended. Maybe even V once your ships get bigger and more expensive.
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| **[[Skills:Armor#EM_Armor_Compensation|EM Armor Compensation]]
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| **[[Skills:Armor#Explosive_Armor_Compensation|Explosive Armor Compensation]]
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| **[[Skills:Armor#Kinetic_Armor_Compensation|Kinetic Armor Compensation]]
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| **[[Skills:Armor#Thermal_Armor_Compensation|Thermal Armor Compensation]]
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| *For armor rigs, [[Skills:Rigging#Jury_Rigging|Jury Rigging III]] and [[Skills:Rigging#Armor_Rigging|Armor Rigging I]] are required to fit the Tech I rigs, [[Skills:Rigging#Armor_Rigging|Armor Rigging]] also reduces the speed penalty by 10% per level, at level 4 you can fit Tech 2 rigs.
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| *[[Skills:Armor#Repair_Systems|Repair Systems]] is required to operate armor repair-units effectively - each level reduces repair systems duration by 5%. Tech II units are available at skill level IV, though training to level V is recommended to minimize the length of repair unit cycles. It should be noted that a reduction in activation time increase the capacitor need of the module.
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| *[[Skills:Armor#Armor_Layering|Armor Layering]] reduces the mass penalty of fitting armor plates by 5% per level. Which means that if a ship is fitted with an armor plate, training this skill up improves both the ships agility all the time, and top speed when using an afterburner or microwarpdrive. In other words training this skill up will reduce some of the disadvantages of choosing to armor tank.
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| *[[Skills:Armor#Armor_Resistance_Phasing|Armor Resistance Phasing]] is useful if you fit a Reactive Armor Hardener, It reduces the cycle time of the module (10% per level) and decreases the capacitor need (10% per level). More information on the Reactive Armor Hardener later in the class.
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| *[[Skills:Shields#Shield_Management|Shield Management]] while not technically an armor tanking skill, increases your overall shield hit points by 5% per level, which helps any ship, regardless of the way its tanked.
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| *[[Skills:Shields#Tactical_Shield_Manipulation|Tactical Shield Manipulation]] also not technically an armor tanking skill (actually required for a Tech 2 shield tank) but it helps increase your shield buffer. When your shields fall below 25% damage starts "leaking" through to your armor, training this skill helps minimize how much damage leaks through, when trained to level 5 no damage leaks through. This is a "nice to have" when it comes to armor tanking but not required.
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| ==Armor Module Reference== | | ==Armor Module Reference== |
