Fit Kitchen: Hecate

The Hecate is another one of those ships that does one thing really really well and everyone knows it. With this little Gallente destroyer, that would be extreme blaster DPS at 2km at the expense of nearly all else. Combined with instawarp, a good hull tank, and a microwarpdrive bonus and you can start melting anything from frigates to cruisers and even some carriers if you sig tank their fighters enough. It has also been popularised in recent years by Xtra Squishy to the applause of…Youtube comments.

I’m not going to lie, though, doing stupidly high DPS vs almost anything is super fun. It’s why I love the polarised Cynabal so much and, in the words of a corp member “you could pull a Traynor and kill any fight by dropping a marauder.”

You might notice something a little special about that defence mode which completely destroys the Hecate in PvE, a cycle time bonus! Combine that with a bigger sig than the Confessor, trashy T2 resists, and subpar weapons and you have something that is all-round meh at PvE unless you relegate yourself to the easiest content in the game. There is the L4 Faction Warfare mission runner which works, but I’ve never done it and there are much better guides on FW mission running out there.

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The Standard Fits

So I said that everyone knows what the Hecate does, right? Let’s take a look at how it does that with a few fit examples of the facehugging 800 DPS+ type. Most people will head straight for the hull tanked version because it has dual web, is incredibly simple, and is just that bit different to most other ships that they own. What I propose instead is a shield tanked Hecate. It’s much better than the hull tank since you can fill out some of those rig slots with the amazing Hyperspatial Velocity Optimizer to bring your warp speed up to 6.85 or even 7.82 AU/s. Combined with instawarp that’s just insane and I can promise you’ll get so many more fights simply by landing on grid before they can escape. You’ve still got similar DPS, tank, and utility to hull tank fits so they are few reasons not to use this.

So why don’t I like the basic bitch hull tank? Well it actually has less EHP than a shield tank since a chunk of the tank is locked away behind the defence mode resist bonus, something that nobody will ever use when sharpshooter is available. A hull tank also typically only has one fight in it before it’s time to go home. What’s worse, any attempt to use the low slots with Reinforced Bulkheads will disable your 2s align time with their 5% inertia penalty! Worse still, this cannot be fixed with a rig or low slot since hull tanks have stacking bonuses and not penalties. Each new bulkhead gives more tank than the last so dropping just one really hurts. I’ve dropped my version below which uses a Burst Jammer for some clutch plays but you’re welcome to go dual web or a weapon disruptor instead.

And thirdly, there’s a polarised Hecate. It’s the typical fit that everyone gets excited about because big DPS numbers go brrrr. All three of these fits work by smashing into someone’s face and heating until you win. You just need to be aware of your tiny Void range and be ready to switch to Null ammo if your opponent starts to pull away.

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About That Rep Bonus…

Even though I don’t like it I can’t really ignore the rep bonus that the Hecate has since we can certainly do some interesting stuff with it. To begin with I went ahead and created a PvE fit despite the limitations that it has. I’ve gone for blaster+MWD to make use of the bonuses and keep this ship as just a bit different. If you want something that’s truly effective at range with a solid tank and solid DPS then use something like a Confessor instead. Honestly, I don’t know what you’d use this for other than easy highsec content. Regardless, I’ve included some refits in the cargo to improve the cap, tank, or add a web. Again, this is just a bit different but if you’d rather ignore all the bonuses and try using 1MN+railguns then consider what you’re doing and if a different ship would be better.

Second up is the single rep Hecate which has just about enough cap to work. And it works super well, actually! Obviously lower DPS compared to the buffer options, but you can change that if you prefer by dropping the armour resists. This particular configuration tanks about 356 EHP/s which is pretty decent for this hull size, though you can take it further by dropping some DPS or even dropping to Ion Blasters and using a Nanobot Accelerator rig. It flies just like every other Hecate really except this one is point, click, then rep.

Now you might think that the natural evolution from here is single rep -> dual rep, right? As it turns out with that defence mode, dual rep eats up way too much cap for a single cap booster so you’re going to need to address your cap problems straight away. While you’re at it, it’s not too much of a stretch to turn dual rep into triple rep and get some… interesting results. I’ve used T2+ancil to keep this crazy concept fit cheap but it looks like hella fun to fly, repping as much as 815 EHP/s in a burst. This is not the best way to fly a Hecate but if you’re anything like me and you enjoy doing something different for fun then try it out!

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Ranged Rails

As is always the tradition with my articles, let’s finish off the Hecate with the other weapon system it can use, railguns. Notably, it has the same problem which befalls the other T3D’s which is that switching mode can kill you. You need the speed from propulsion to kite, but you need the damage and range from sharpshooter. What do you do? It’s not an easy question to answer because it really depends on the situation. If you get it wrong then the 10-second timer might end up killing you as you are scrammed and popped. It can, at the very least, still perform decently in a long-range support role similar to the Confessor.

To perform in that long-range support role you need to really give up any idea of tank and start relying on sensor damps to not die. Keep them turned off and slam 2x targeting range damps on anyone who looks at you, at least until you can warp or reposition. The fit should do about as well as two equivalent Cormorants or Harpies which is decent enough. It’s not something I’d like to fly but it should get the job done for anyone who wants to just hold some DPS on target for a long time with range flexibility up to nearly 100km.

Trying to get in closer for a bit solo PvP with rails isn’t particularly fruitful as you start to run into either fitting issues with Medium Shield Extenders, the shame of running Small Shield Extenders, or a kind of meh all-round ok armour fit. It’s the armour fit that I’m linking below which runs about with about 7k EHP in propulsion mode and the ability to swap to defence to rep back at 143 EHP/s. DPS comes to 332 at 18-24km and you’ve got that combo of point+web to apply it and protect yourself a bit. Note that you can swap to a better restrained MWD if you have perfect rigging skills.

Overall this was another somewhat boring ship to fit. The T3Ds are somewhat flexible in what they can do on grid, but they all seem to have been designed with relatively niche roles in mind. Or maybe it’s just the fact that they are destroyers which aren’t as flexible as ships with more slots. I hope you guys have enjoyed the T3D rundown anyway, I’ve been meaning to do it for ages!