Merlin Refit to Blasters

The previous successful battles with the Rifter and Tristan would not imply the need to refit the Merlin but Starwalker had now trained Small Hybrid Turrets to V. That almost necessitated the switch to blasters. The clear trade off was higher DPS at close range but a lot less damage out to the edge of scrambler range.

That extra DPS would have been useful in the Rifter fight and may have enabled Starwalker to escape before the Tristan arrived. Generally in New Eden there were few problems that could not be solved with more DPS. 

There was an opportunity to try the new blaster fit as the R1FTA roam, commanded by Sorn Nordvind, went from Molden Heath to Essence. It started quietly with no action in the first dozen or so systems. The scout, Yuzuki Katayanagi, then found a young pilot, Nero Xylius, ratting in a Harbinger in Mannar. There was a certain inevitability to what would happen next but it was an opportunity to see how the blasters would perform.

Yuzuki called point and the R1FTA swarm arrived on scene to find the Harbinger releasing drones but well and truly caught. With the rest of the rebels there it had no chance and all of its waves of drones were decimated. The Harbinger desperately tried (unsuccessfully) to take down a rebel with it but it too died. It was a very nice kill and the Harbinger was actually well fit for a new pilot.

Starwalker had not bothered to overheat as that was unnecessary and he had been able to orbit at around 2km for the entire fight. He had briefly shot at the drones but most of the time was spent shooting the Harbinger. The log revealed that the blasters had regularly missed the battlecruiser and had not even hit the Warrior II drones. It was something to consider as a webbed battlecruiser would be going far slower than any webbed frigate.

The Merlin that was killed a little later was destroyed so quickly that Starwalker was not able to test any changes. Next time Starwalker would try a few changes:

• Most importantly to use Caldari Navy Antimatter rather than Void, which has a -25% tracking penalty
• To use keep at range instead of orbit
• Train the Motion Prediction skill from level IV to V

It was too early to tell yet if shifting from autocannons to blasters was a good idea but it was a good ship that only had one real problem - it was slow.