An Introduction to Ratting [Brave Collective]

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====== An Introduction to Ratting ======

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Ratting is a type of moneymaking that involves killing NPC ships for their bounty payouts. It's relatively straightforward, can be done using a variety of ships, and is one of most stable ways to make money in Eve.

Almost every naturally hostile NPC in Eve has a bounty payout. You can see this payout by selecting //Show Info// on these ships and looking below their name. They'll also have a red //WANTED// banner over their images. 

Ratting is usually split into two categories, Belt Ratting and Cosmic Anomaly (Anom) Ratting.

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===== Before You Get Started =====

If you've never ratted before, give these sections a read to avoid common mistakes and get some background knowledge.

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==== Things to Know ====

<text type="success">**You should always be on comms and in standing fleet so you can hear intel and call for support in real time.**</text>

<text type="success">**It's often worth insuring your ship when ratting in a subcapital. This can lessen the sting of losing your ship.**</text>

<text type="warning">**Even if you can, you want to avoid going fully AFK while ratting as it makes you an easy target for roaming hostiles.**</text>

=== On Ship Fittings ===

<text type="success">**Guns, damage enhancing modules, and drones can usually be safely downgraded on ratting ships.**</text> 

<text type="warning">**However, ships that have had their tank, propulsion, or capacitor related modules downgraded may lose their ability to safely run some or all sites.**</text>

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==== Choosing a System ====

<text type="warning">**Avoid ratting in our staging systems, as these usually have consistent hostile activity along with cloaky campers.**</text>

=== System Geography ===

The Geography of a system will determine how often you're interrupted by hostiles, and how quickly support can reach you if you need it. 

Systems deep into our space, away from standard travel routes, and in dead-end pockets require more work for hostiles to reach, lowering your chance of being interrupted. Proximity to a staging system and standing fleet will allow support to reach you more quickly if you come under attack. 

=== Security Status ===

Security Status or "TrueSec" as it's often called is static and can be thought of as a measurement of a system's value for moneymaking. TrueSec determines which sites can spawn in a system (see the [[https://support.eveonline.com/hc/en-us/articles/210777969-Sovereignty-System-Upgrades|Sovereignty System Upgrades]] support page for a full breakdown), and influences the spawn rates of Faction and Officer NPCs. 

The higher a system's TrueSec, the more ratting capacity it can sustain at one time. 

=== Bounty Multiplier ===

As its name suggests the Bounty Multiplier is a direct multiplier on bounties gained in a system. It has a <text type="warning">**base value of 150%**</text>, <text type="success">**increases with PvP kills**</text> in the system (up to 200%), and <text type="danger">**decreases with PvE Activity**</text> in the system. 

This mechanic counters the advantages of the two above factors, forcing pilots to choose between lower ticks in a safer / higher capacity area and higher ticks in a more dangerous / lower capacity area. 

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===== Belt Ratting =====

Belt ratting is a common early moneymaking activity for new players, and later on a very lucrative opportunity to find extremely rare officer modules. 

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==== Process ====

As the name suggests, belt ratting simply involves going through a system's asteroid belts looking for rats to kill. This is usually done with either a frigate or destroyer, as cruisers are more suited to anomaly ratting. After the [[https://www.eveonline.com/news/view/patch-notes-version-19-03|April 2021 Update]], many asteroid belts were removed and stargates became a go-to area for this kind of ratting as well.

As this is an early game activity, it's recommended that you loot and salvage the ships you destroy so as to get as much money as possible out of each belt. 

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==== Belt Rats to Keep an Eye Out For ====

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=== Officer Rats ===

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These are one-in-a-million chance rats that can drop tens of billions of Isk on destruction. These are spottable as battleship class rats that have an actual name compared to the normal rank-based names of rats. If you are the first to find an officer rat in Brave Space, you are entitled to the loot and may request standing fleet's help in acquiring it, as these rats are extremely hard to kill without capitals. 

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=== Faction Commanders ===

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Commanders are ships that are slightly more difficult to destroy than normal rats, but which drop faction modules on destruction. They can be spotted by their unique name which is always prefixed with the name of a pirate sub-faction (ie. Dread Guristas, True Sansha, etc.)

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=== Haulers ===

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Haulers are industrial ship rats which are rarely found in belts, sometimes surrounded by hostile rats. They drop a large amount of minerals on destruction which can be worth hundreds of millions of ISK. There are several different variations for each faction, but they all are marked for a bounty and all will drop minerals on destruction. 

Whatever you do, //DO NOT// mix these up with an NPC Mining Operation. Those are marked by actual mining ships which slowly clear belts over time, and attacking them will result in a full defense fleet landing on and destroying you. 

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===== Cosmic Anomaly Ratting =====

Cosmic Anomalies or Anoms as they're often called are quite a bit more complicated than belt ratting. They involve warping to a site in deadspace, and clearing several waves of rats before the site is complete. 

This comes with several advantages, as Anomalies provide a measurable and steady income, a variable difficulty depending on the site you choose. and a much higher payout than belt ratting. As a tradeoff though, you must have a ship which is capable of tanking each wave while you destroy them.

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==== Process ====

There are several ways to run anomalies, and the process differs quite heavily for each of them.

=== Drone Cruiser or Battlecruiser ===

Running anomalies in a drone boat usually involves landing on field, finding a good orbit, and letting your drones do all the difficult work. Once you get the hang of it, Anomaly Ratting can even be a Semi-AFKable activity using this method.

The most commonly used ships in this category are the Vexor, Gila, Ishtar, and Myrmidon. 

=== Drone Battleship ===

While cruisers and battlecruisers can rely on their speed-tank to survive, battleships require a hearty local tank to deal with the heavy incoming damage from the sites they run. These ships can run a sniper config, or a more AFKable one similar to what Drone Cruisers do. In both cases the site is usually tanked by a specialized active fitting.

The most commonly used ships in this category are the Dominix and Rattlesnake. 

=== Smartbombing Battleship ===

TBA

=== Carriers ===

Carrier ratting is an extremely high <tooltip title="Actions-Per-Minute">APM</tooltip> activity compared to the previous methods, but offers a very high income with relatively low risk to your ship. 

This method involves immediately aligning out to a safe once you land, and unleashing your fighters upon the site. Smaller rats should be destroyed before larger ones as they can cause damage to your fighters over time, and your missile volleys should be saved for the battleships. Also keep in mind that your fighters should **always** be moving, since the battleships can rack up an extreme amount of a damage in a short period if you're not careful. You can utilize an NSA depending on how risk averse you are, but bear in mind activating it prevents you from warping for the 60 second duration of its cycle. 

The most commonly used carriers for ratting are the Nidhoggur and Thanatos for their bonuses to fighter damage. 

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==== Commonly Run Sites ====

<text type="warning">**You generally want to avoid sites with the "Forlorn" or "Hidden" prefixes, as their trigger-based spawns can quickly overwhelm most ships if not done carefully.**</text>

=== Forsaken Rally Points ===

Forsaken Rally Points are the lowest difficulty site that players should run in nullsec. These are best suited to ships such as T1 Vexors, and those trying anomaly ratting for the first time.

=== Forsaken Hubs ===

Forsaken Hubs are recommended for Dominixes, Gilas, Ishtars, and other drone-based ratting ships. This site provides great payouts because of the high ratio of Battleships to other rats. 

=== Havens ===

Havens are recommended for higher tier drone ratting ships such as the Rattlesnake (please don't get one of these for anoms), along with Carrier ratting. They have a higher quantity of battleships than lower tier sites, but many less sought after rats as well. These also have a difficult final wave which spawns over a dozen battleships and battlecruisers. 

Havens come in two variants, Stargate (or Rock) havens, and Gas havens. The former is generally considered better for ratting and easier to run. An easy way to tell the difference between to the two is to initiate warp to a haven and then immediately cancel it. If you get a popup message, it's a Stargate haven. 

=== Sanctums ===

Sanctums are usually only preferred when ratting in a carrier or supercarrier, as the distance that each wave spawns from the previous discourages AFKing them and may result in lost drones or even ships for subcapitals. 

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==== Anomaly Rats to Keep an Eye Out For ====

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=== NPC Capitals ===

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NPC capitals don't come with the same tank or firepower as real capitals, but they can still be extremely dangerous and rewarding. The loot they drop depends quite a bit on chance and whether or not the capital is a faction variation, in which case it has a chance of dropping a faction capital module BPC. All NPC capitals can drop anywhere from a few hundred thousand to several hundred million isk work of named components and other items, along with up to a hundred million isk in salvage. 

NPC capitals can and will alpha battleships and smaller if you give them enough time to lock you, so unless you're prepared to deal with them you should warp out as soon as one spawns and call for assistance. If you are the first to find a capital rat in Brave Space, you are entitled to the loot (NOT Salvage However) and may request standing fleet's help in acquiring it.

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=== Faction Commanders ===

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Commanders are ships that are slightly more difficult to destroy than normal rats, but which drop faction modules on destruction. They can be spotted by their unique name which is always prefixed with the name of a pirate sub-faction (ie. Dread Guristas, True Sansha, etc.) 

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==== Types of Rats ====

The different regions of New Eden are home to different NPC faction rats, which all have a different damage/resist profile. As we live in Querious, there are Blood Raider rats.

The [[https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/NPC_damage_types|UniWiki]] has an overview.

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===== The Ratting Progression Chain =====

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**[[/public/dojo/vexor-newbro-edition|The Vexor Newbro Edition]]** \\ <fs small>Gallente T1 Cruiser</fs> \\ <label type="primary">Free From The Dojo!</label> <label type="success">Low Skills</label>

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**[[/public/dojo/wiki/myrmidon-ratting|The Ratting Myrmidon]]** \\ <fs small>Gallente T1 Battlecruiser</fs> \\ <label type="success">~80 Million ISK</label> <label type="success">Low Skills</label>

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**[[/public/dojo/wiki/gila-ratting|The Ratting Gila]]** \\ <fs small>Guristas Faction Cruiser</fs> \\ <label type="warning">~390 Million ISK</label> <label type="success">Low Skills</label>

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**[[/public/dojo/wiki/ishtar-ratting|The Isktar]]** \\ <fs small>Gallente Heavy Assault Cruiser</fs> \\ <label type="warning">~225 Million ISK</label> <label type="warning">Medium Skills</label>

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**[[/public/dojo/wiki/marauder-ratting|Ratting Marauders]]** \\ <fs small>Caldari / Gallente Marauders</fs> \\ <label type="danger">1 - 2 Billion ISK</label> <label type="danger">High Skills</label>

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**[[/public/dojo/wiki/carrier-ratting|Ratting Carriers]]** \\ <fs small>Minmatar Carrier</fs> \\ <label type="danger">3 - 4 Billion ISK</label> <label type="default">Capital Skills</label>

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**[[/public/dojo/wiki/super-ratting|Ratting Supers]]** \\ <fs small>Minmatar Supercarrier</fs> \\ <label type="danger">38 - 42 Billion ISK</label> <label type="default">Capital Skills</label>

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{{tag>Ratting Guide Intro All English}}