-- Douglas Adams
I've talked about the Arbitrator here before. For those keeping track, it's been nearly ten months since I first undocked in one, but I've so far held back on doing any sort of review of the ship as I have previously done with the Punisher, Vengeance, or Malediction. The simple explanation is that I wanted to feel I had really gotten a good handle on what the ship was and was not capable of before attempting to provide advice to others about it. That day is finally here, so sit back, relax, and get ready for another long one.
Let me start this off by saying that the Arbitrator is extremely versatile, with a 4/4/4 slot layout and bonuses to only Drones as a weapon type there are potentially a lot of ways an Arbitrator fitting can go. It's one of the things that has kept this post from happening for so long. While I was able to write (what I feel at least) was a good summary of a Frigate class vessel after only a couple of months of flying one, it's much harder to say what the Arbitrator is and isn't capable of doing simply because of the difficulty in saying exactly how an Arbitrator should be fit. I'll be talking about some specific fits towards the end of the post today, but for now we'll be painting in broad strokes.
Target Selection
The Arbitrator is a ship I would take to fight toe-to-toe against the majority of the ships in EVE. Now, that's a bold statement, so allow me to throw a few caveats into the mix. First off, Missile ships are not your friend in an Arbi. If you can't Tracking Disrupt its weapons, or Neut away its tank (which pretty much defines the ever popular Drake), very bad things are likely to happen to you. However, having said that, there are still only a handful of ships that I would cross immediately from the Arbitrators list of viable targets. The second restriction on that statement is that not every Arbitrator fit is going to be able to take on every ship that the hull itself is capable of defeating. You will need to make decisions during the fitting process that will cross certain ships off the list of targets, while opening you up to others.
The other point I'd like to make now, although it will probably be said again during the fitting portion of this post, is that I've found target selection in the Arbitrator to be a bit counterintuitive. Conventional wisdom would tell you that the Arbitrator, as a drone ship, should absolutely destroy Frigates and that these will be your primary prey. The problem with this statement is that the Frigate pilot has likely heard it as well. Virtually anything ever said about the viability of engaging in a solo Frigate will include the statement to steer clear of Arbitrators and Vexors. My own experience has led me to believe that the Arbitrator's lock time is insufficient to catch any Frigate pilot that doesn't want to get caught and the only ones that want to get caught usually have friends very close by.
New Player Friendly?
While it is certainly a good ship to fly, the Arbitrator is not without drawbacks of which there are two that immediately spring to mind. The Arbitrator is skill intensive and the Arbitrator is skill intensive. No, that wasn't a typo, but they are very different sorts of skills. I'm talking about Character vs Player skill here, and they're both worth examining in a bit more detail.
First, let's address the skills your character will need to fly this thing. While they're not particularly demanding, and you may find yourself already possessing them if you're an experienced player of EVE, Drone skills are not something the novice Amarr player is likely to have a lot of when examining which T1 Cruiser they should fly first. While the Arbitrator is capable of dealing a respectable (for a Cruiser) 238DPS with a full flight of Hammerhead II's and all related skills at V, that same flight of Hammerhead II's from a character just barely able to launch them will do 60DPS. The disparity between being able to fit them and their maximum potential is much larger here than many other weapons systems in the game and is an important consideration to make before embarking on a training path that will take about three months. The good news here is that once that training is done, it will continue to benefit you as virtually all ships beyond the Cruiser level have a meaningful drone capacity.
The second consideration is just how player skill intensive the Arbitrator can be to fly. If you're new to EVE, your experience thus far has probably been with Frigates. You've learned the intricacies of managing a point, a web, a propulsion module and maybe some active tank/cap management depending on what you're flying plus some grouped guns. As you'll see when we get to the fittings themselves, I regularly fly Arbitrators with 8 or 9 active modules to worry about in combat. That doesn't even take into consideration what will be your new mini-game of EVE; Drone management. To put that into a bit of perspective, I also fly Battlecruisers and Battleships that need me to keep an eye on right around 6 active modules during a fight, so it isn't just that you get more modules the bigger the ship is, the Arbitrator really does take some micro-management skills to fly properly. The good news is that when everything's firing on all cylinders for you, it will feel absolutely amazing.
Fittings
As promised, I'll be presenting four separate fittings for the Arbitrator and a bit of light discussion following each. Before I get to that, I'll be addressing the fittings in broader strokes here.
Tank
As previously mentioned, the Arbitrator has both 4 low and 4 medium slots. If only presented with that information, I might be inclined to think the Arbitrator a potential contender for a 1 or 2 slot Shield tank coupled with damage mods in the lows and thus ready to do some kiting action. If you've had the same thought yourself, I would caution against it. There are several reasons that this approach to tanking isn't recommended for the Arbitrator. The most obvious is likely to be the Amarr resist profile naturally lending itself to Armor tanking, but this hasn't stopped the Shield Curse or Harbinger pilot, so why should it stop you? The second, and still pretty obvious reason, is that you do receive a bonus to Tracking Disruptors, which require a midslot, and foregoing them is generally going to cut out a lot of potential targets. The final, and slightly more nuanced, reason involves the potential gains from any damage mods placed in the ships lows. With only 2 Turret and 1 Launcher hardpoints with no bonuses for them, and damage module is unlikely to be worth the lowslot it takes up.
Accepting that an Armor tank is the way to go, the question becomes whether to Active Tank, Buffer Tank, or fall somewhere in the middle with a smaller plate and a single Armor Repair module. There are benefits and drawbacks to each of these choices and we'll be examining each option in the individual fittings section to follow. For now, just understand that there's going to be a delicate balance between Fitting Requirements and Cap Stability if you're trying to design your own fit.
Gank
As mentioned before, the primary weapon system of the Arbitrator are its drones, but that still leaves us with 4 high slots to fill and you're probably wondering what guns you should put there. As you'll see, every fit I've ever come up with for the Arbitrator has used some combination of Neuts or Nos, entirely foregoing extra DPS. There are a number of reasons for this, but I do still include a fitting I
The reason that Energy Neutralizers or Nosferatus are so popular on the Arbitrator is likely twofold. The first being the obvious parallels drawn between the ship and its T2 counterparts, the Curse and Pilgrim. While those two ships actually receive some sort of bonus to these modules, the Arbitrator does not, and the simple explanation is that many players who are flying the Arbitrator would like to be flying one of those T2 ships. The objectively better reason to do so involves the fighting style that naturally lends itself to the Arbitrator hull.
The Arbitrator, and by extension the Pilgrim and to a lesser extent the Curse, can be viewed as the Boa Constrictors of New Eden. The bonused Tracking Disruptors to mitigate incoming damage, coupled with the slow and steady DPS of their drones means that winning a fight in one is a case of slowly putting your opponent into a situation that he simply cannot win. The unique thing about this method of using E-War to win a fight, unlike with using ECM, is that the opponent is unlikely to immediately see that the fight is lost. Instead, the fight begins with the Arbitrator taking plenty of damage, until a point that a stable orbit has been settled into and Energy Neutralizers are able to start strangling the life from the other ship.
Fitting 1. Above Class Killer
[Arbitrator, ]
Damage Control II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
800mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Warp Scrambler II
Medium Capacitor Booster II, Cap Booster 25
Tracking Disruptor II
10MN Afterburner II
Medium Energy Neutralizer II
Medium Energy Neutralizer II
Small Energy Neutralizer II
Small Energy Neutralizer II
Medium Ancillary Current Router I
Medium Ancillary Current Router I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Hammerhead II x5
This is my go-to fit for taking on a Battlecruiser or Battleship solo. The 2 Medium Neuts become essential when fighting a Battlecruiser that relies on Capacitor for its weapons to fire, but even against one that does not will generally ensure it has to make due without so much as a Webifier to keep you from avoiding damage while Orbiting at 500m. Against a Battleship sized Cap reserve the Neutralizers are less helpful, but the Tracking Disruptor + AB combo more than makes up for it.
Where this fitting misses out are in two separate areas. First as a mission killer the Afterburner cripples its ability to reliably catch what would otherwise be an easy kill inside a mission. If traveling with a gang that includes a Prober (or using an Alt yourself) the amount of time spent traveling between mission gates or simply from the default warp in is often far too much to assist in the fight. By the same token, its Afterburner coupled with its lack of Web makes it difficult to pin down a competent Frigate pilot, assuming they realize quickly enough to have any capacitor left to run their own AB. Even a single Small Nos may provide enough Cap to give him a single cycle of his propulsion, which is often enough to propel him out of Scram range.
As mentioned in a previous post, this fitting can be optimized further by exchanging a Current Router for another Trimark at the expense of switching the Neuts to their Meta-4 counterparts. As more often than not when I lose one it's because my opponent is joined by several additional ships, I don't generally consider the added performance to be worth the extra cost in ISK, but your mileage may vary.
Fitting 2. On Par Crusher
[Arbitrator, ]
Damage Control II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
400mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Medium Armor Repairer II
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon Microwarpdrive
Medium Electrochemical Capacitor Booster I, Navy Cap Booster 800
Warp Scrambler II
Tracking Disruptor II
Medium Unstable Power Fluctuator I
Small Energy Neutralizer II
Small Energy Neutralizer II
Small Energy Neutralizer II
Medium Nanobot Accelerator I
Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Hammerhead II x5
Where the last fitting missed out on in target selection is exactly where this one excels. Against a PvP fit Cruiser or Assault Frigate is where this ship really shines. The Active Tank coupled with TD should be more than capable of handling the DPS of a ship in its own class or below. Additionally, the single Medium plus four Small Neuts are a match for their Capacitors. In fact, the third Small Neut should allow for your to more readily stagger their cycles ensuring that a lucky Small Nos doesn't let a Frigate escape. Even if your opponent does get off an Afterburner cycle, their unlikely to also manage to scram you at the same time, allowing you to simply MWD at them to prevent them from outranging your own Warp Scrambler.
Where this ship struggles is really against the oh-so-popular-in-Lowsec Battlecruiser. The single Medium Neut just isn't able to shut down a Battlecruiser's Capacitor before it's able to overcome your own tank. That coupled with the MWD over AB for a propulsion module leaves most PvP Hurricanes still able to get hits while Tracking Disrupted. Avoiding damage is further hampered by your own inability to maintain a stable orbit up close at MWD speeds. The same problem applies when trying to outrun the Large Turrets of a Battleship, allowing glancing shots to continue through. This coupled with the Drones of a Battleship will generally make those fights untenable, although still possible.
3. Frigate Gang Ganker
[Arbitrator, ]
Damage Control II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
1600mm Reinforced Rolled Tungsten Plates I
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon Microwarpdrive
Warp Scrambler II
Stasis Webifier II
Tracking Disruptor II
Small Nosferatu II
Small Nosferatu II
Small Nosferatu II
Small Nosferatu II
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Hobgoblin II x5
While I spoke above about the difficulty in getting a Frigate pilot to willingly engage you, there are exceptions to that rule. Sometimes Frigates come in groups, and their confidence is greatly bolstered by their Wingmen. In such instances, a strong buffer with a full set of tackle is often all it takes to carry you through. With 37Kehp and 6 full flights of light Drones, you're truly a Frigate's worst nightmare come to life. I've fought and killed a gangs of three and driven off a gang twice that size in this ship.
Surprisingly, most frigate gangs will choose to engage your drones, hoping that their numbers can quickly remove them from the field. The unlikely scenario where you can launch another 25 where those came from rarely crosses their mind. By the time their mistake is realized, 37Kehp will leave your own ship going down much slower than anyone would expect. Counter to the previous two fits, this one will spend most of its time with the Optimal Range script loaded to tempt Frigate pilots ever closer, ensuring that if they realize they need to bail, they're too close to get away in time.
4. PvE Catastrophe
[Arbitrator, Taioneon]
Medium Armor Repairer II
Medium Armor Repairer II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Damage Control II
Y-T8 Overcharged Hydrocarbon Microwarpdrive
Medium Capacitor Booster II, Navy Cap Booster 800
J5b Phased Prototype Warp Scrambler I
X5 Prototype Engine Enervator
200mm AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet Phased Plasma S
200mm AutoCannon II, Republic Fleet Phased Plasma S
Small Nosferatu II
Small Nosferatu II
Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Medium Auxiliary Nano Pump I
Hammerhead II x5
The inspiration for this final fit came from a post by fellow blogger Tai Maac, although I've modified it in a couple of ways to fit my own tastes. This was one of the first Arbitrator fits I tried flying and the modifications are a direct result of that. First, I have laughable Laser skills for an Amarr pilot which necessitated changing the originally fit Medium Pulse Lasers for some Autocannons. If you've taken a more traditional path through the Amarr ships, feel free to exchange the guns for whatever you see fit. I personally found the added Cap Stability provided by Autocannons to help with the tank though, and that brings me to the second change I made. Swapping one of the Nano Pumps for a Nanobot Accelerator will provide an 8% bump in your tank, but will make it that much harder to simply leave the Reppers running as they will cycle faster and thus drain your Capacitor more quickly.
This fit was originally designed to go on lengthy roams through 0.0 hunting for PvE fit ships ratting in belts, and the target selection reflects that. Using the small guns to defend yourself from enemy drones or to directly attack a Frigate, you'll usually have the right combination of tank and gank to win any fight. As I said, I first flew this ship before I was an Outlaw (And before I scared ratters away by simply entering local) and it did just fine against anybody that wasn't expecting a fight. Since then, my tastes have changed somewhat and I'm rarely satisfied by targets that don't fight back. Against a PvP ship larger than a Frigate this fitting can really struggle. The reliance on a purely active tank leaves it wide open to Neuting, with even a single Medium Neut leaving it struggling to run Rep cycles even with the Cap Booster, and the prevalence of an Energy Neutralizer in a utility high slot makes this fairly likely these days.
The lack of Neuts or Tracking Disruptors also leaves the ship with little to offer when brought in to support fellow pilots in a small gang fight. While these fits were all designed and addressed in this post as Solo fits, it's still nice to be able to offer something when flying with others. Some of the other fits are able to disable as many as three other ships in a fight (Engage Drones on enemy Tackle, Optimal Range Disrupt a Kiting Ship, and Neut anyone relying too much on Capacitor, in case you're wondering), while this fitting is a far more traditional Active Tank with DPS combo. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, of course, it just doesn't often fit my playstyle these days.
It's About Time
Finally wrapping this thing up, just let me say that I hope this helps some player new to the Arbitrator. If you have any questions/comments/concerns, or would like to point out a fit that might be helpful for the budding Pirates of New Eden, please feel free to leave it in the comments bellow.
Regarrrds,
FNG
You missed the opportunity to title this "It's about FNG time for an Arbitrator Guide". Great advice in here, please don't make us wait so long between posts!
ReplyDeleteI would heartily disagree with regards to the shield tanked nano-Arbitrator. It is possible to be cap stable running the MWD, long point and TD. At that range (with optimal script loaded), cruisers and below are fair game. In this setup, Med Neuts and 200mm AC are defensive measures.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, good guide.
@Anon1245 D'oh! You're right, that would have been a far better post title.
ReplyDelete@Anon1828 We shall have to agree to disagree it seems. With 3 CPRs in the lows, you can get it cap stable, but it's just so slow. At ~1300m/s you're just asking to get caught by anyone with a MWD/Scram and almost anybody who can find the Overheat option on their AB. With Nanos/Overdrives in the Lows, you can reach a far more respectable ~1700m/s, but at the cost of having about a minute and a half of Cap. If the Arbitrator had 1 more mid, I'd love to have a Cap Booster and do just that, but dropping the TD (Leaving you open to more damage than you can absorb), the LSE (Cutting your EHP in half), or the Point/MWD (Which makes this all pointless anyway) I don't find acceptable. I can almost get on board with Speed Rigs to do ~1500m/s at the cost of 25% of your EHP, but it all just ends up sort of mediocre then. If you have to have a shield kiting Arbitrator, you can shoehorn the ship into that role(For the sake of a fleet roam for instance, in which case I might just drop the point), but it's just not going to excel.
Anon1828: FWIW, I agree that the shield Arbi is a bit of a "shoehorn". It fits my play style, my skills and frankly that every plated ship I fly (other than the SFI) is too slow for my taste. I have had luck with a combination of nano/DC/CPRx2 in the lows. It give a balance of cap, speed (and with shield rigs) decent EHP. That being said, the engagement envelope should be any turret based frigate hull, or any brawler cruisers (plated Thorax, Vexor or Rupture).
ReplyDeleteKiting with a drone boat is almost never a good idea vs decent player(s), as they'll simply destroy your drones.
ReplyDeleteGreat guide, thanks!
ReplyDeleteArby pilot here on training path to Pilgrim/Curse and taking it _slowly_, i.e,. (a) I'm not gonna sit in one of the T2s until I have essentially ALL the certificate/support skills and (b) I'm not gonna PVP in the arby till I essentially have 'mastery' of salient support skills.
I've been having a lot of fun with a long-range fit for PVE that is very similar to the Fitting 1. Above Class Killer (except drone link augmentor II, drone naviation computer I, salvager, tractor, sensor booster II). This allows targetting out to about 83km and drone control out to bout 69km
I have two questions:
1. Is there really no way to fit out a long-range arby 'sniper' for PVP? Damn shame that there is no such thing as a warp jammer drone in this game.
2. I'm curious about Fitting 1. Above Class Killer. It seems its main limitation is that it is slow, and the seemingly most obvious solution to that would be MwD. However as you note in your discussion of hte MwD fit arby, this results in unstable orbits and rapidly diminishing cap.
Not having done any PVP in this ship (and as a 4 month old player, not much PVP at all) I wonder if it would be possible to do a speed-boosted version of Fitting 1. Above Class Killer? Perhaps drop a couple of the rigs for astronautics rigs?
Heya Anon0755, glad you liked it. It sounds like you're about where I was when I first started; the Arbitrator was my very first Cruiser and I ran level 2 & 3 missions with it. The Amarr Recons have great reputations in PvP, but it took me the better part of a year to finally feel I had all the necessary skills to pilot one (Admittedly, I'm a bit conservative in my approach to flying a new ship). Although I didn't discuss it here, the Arbi makes a great low-level mission ship due to the lack of Ammo required and available high slots for Tractors and Salvagers.
ReplyDeleteAs to your questions:
1. The problem you're likely to find in using the Arbitrator for Sniping is simply in the way drone damage works. You won't be able to apply it quickly, as you're limited by the drone's travel time. One thing the Arbitrator can do well from range is protect other ships, pairing with a Blackbird or a Stealth Bomber for example, your Tracking Disruptors can help keep you both safe, while your Drones can either defend against fast tacklers or apply your full DPS to the main fight from 60km away.
2. I won't lie, putting an Afterburner on the Arbitrator gives up a lot. You're much more vulnerable when simply moving on gates and crashing missions can leave you too slow to get to the fight when you land 100km from the target. I've also found the Arazu to be my mortal enemy, as even a single bonused Sensor Damp can leave you unable to target it and you're too slow to catch up. (That exact example is still one of the most agonizingly slow deaths I've ever had in EVE.)
However, those examples are not what that first fit was made to do. Against a lone Battleship or Battlecruiser (or even BS/BC + a Frigate or two) is where that ship wants to be. In those situations, the difference between a Signature radius of 130 and 780 will decide the entire fight. Added to that, if your target has a Scram, even with the reduced Sig after your MWD shuts off your speed will be too low to outrun Medium guns even under a bonused Tracking Disruptor.
Barring the odd Arazu, this Arbitrator is also fairly capable in a 1v1 against kiting ships like a Kiting Hurricane(you should still be avoiding Drakes at all costs), which is extremely common in Lowsec. With an Optimal Range Script loaded, even a Cane with 2 Tracking Enhancers that refuses to come in close will lose in a straight up DPS race. He can always just warp off, but more often than not will come in close to just brawl down your silly little T1 Cruiser...apply Neuts, Switch to Tracking Speed Script and proceed to AB at 500m where his guns can't track.
As a T1 Hull, the Arbitrator is much closer to being a Pilgrim that can't cloak than it is to being a Curse. The Curse is popular as a kiting ship because its bonus to Neut Range allows it to apply them from the edge of point range while its extra 2 midslots mean it can fit either a beefy shield tank, or enough TDs to keep it safe out there. The Arbitrator or Pilgrim, lacking these advantages, just doesn't pull it off.
Intersting stuff! Thanks for the feedback. Lots to contemplate. I made up a "Bait-n-Switch" fit today that seems very clever to me (having done very little PVP) ;). It exported it from EFT on my other machine, so don't have it handy atm. But will drop in again soon and try to convey it to you. Would love to hear what you think.
ReplyDelete