Battlecruisers
T1 Battlecruiser
Very good mix between gank, tank, agility, speed and cost. Usually short range fitted (especially harbingers due to the awesome scorch), although some people that can't afford/can't fly a heavy assault ship (hac) use them with a long range fit.
HACs are way better for that role though, with better dps and range, so experienced pilots usually do not have a reason to use a LR fit on it since most of them can also fly hacs, and therefore only use the BCs for close range stuff.
BCs also have the ability to fit a single warfare link, which can give extra bonuses to your gang. This will be described more closely in the next section.
- Cyclone: (Minmatar)
- Hurricane: (Minmatar) High DPS and quick for a BC. Can be dangerous to nearly any sized hull if used right.
- Drake: (Caldari) Depending on how it's fit, can either have a massive tank, or deal decent damage.
- Ferox: (Caldari)
- Myrmidon: (Gallente) Usually active tanked, drone-using offensive BC. Versatile and effective. Can also be shield-tanked like a Drake.
- Brutix: (Gallente) Blasterboat, high point-blank dps, usually not well tanked. Sometimes shield-tanked for speed and to clear lowslots for damage mods.
- Prophecy: (Amarr) Can tank better then some BS's. Usually bait. Low DPS.
- Harbinger: (Amarr) Same as Hurricane but can dish more damage and tank a little better. Dependent on cap like most Energy Turret ships.
T2 Battlecruisers
Command Ships
These come in two classes, field command ships, which are basically just a stronger version of the T1 BC with a bit more dps and tank and better resists, and fleet command ships. Fleet command ships get a bonus to their racial warfare links, and in general have extremely good tanks with great resists. The racial links are: Armor for Amarr, Shield for Caldari, Skirmish for Minmatar and Information for Gallente, and there are 3 types of links in each class. If the command ship is in a leadership position in the fleet, everyone below him in the command chain (including normal members) get the following bonus, assuming the command chain is complete (for example, if the CS is wing commander, and there are no squad commanders, or more squads then the CS can handle with its current wing commander level, no bonuses will be applied).
Armor/Shield links:
- Armor/shield resist bonus (stacking penalized with resist mods on the ship)
- Armor/shield repper (both local and remote) cycle time reduction
- Armor/shield repper (both local and remote) cap use reduction (combine 2 and 3 to get RRs with lower cycle time, but same cap use/second as before)
Skirmish:
- Increase speed mod of afterburners and MWDs, so you go faster with them activated.
- Increase the range of warp disruptors/scramblers and webs. HIC points do not receive this bonus.
- Lower signature radius of all ships in gang, making them harder to hit and lock.
Information:
- Boost the strength of EW mods, like ecm and damps
- Increase range of EW mods
- Increase sensor strength (make it harder to jam them, I think it's stacking penalized with ECCM)
The links themselves only give a 2 or 3% boost, but that can be increased ALLOT by training relevant skills, fitting it on the fleet command ship (or a T3 ship with the proper subs, as described above, or to a titan, described below), and by using the racial mind link implant. With all that taken into account, a 2% bonus is increased to 26%, and a 3% bonus become a 39% bonus. That probably make it obvious why fleet command ships can have such a huge impact on the outcome of the battle, despite doing very low dps.
