An additional BC2 may be more useful than a DC2. I will put the DC2 on every combat ship I own though, because it more than doubles your structure hitpoints, and adds unpenalized bonuses to both armor and shields. It really increases your survivability, but the extra Gank may be more important to get out before his friends show up.
I'm finally starting to get some real success with my probe launcher equipped Drake. I was doing some ratting in an empty 0.0 system today and saw another player enter in local. I warped to my safe spot and started scanning, and quickly found a Hurricane in one of the belts. The guy flying it seemed to be fairly new so I hoped I could take him. Warped in, webbed & scrambled and soon enough I'd blown him up.
If you're mainly going after people ratting in belts you can find them much quicker (and with another weapon in your high slots) using the directional scanner.
Getting a DC into there will be tough, although I'll play around with it in EFT to see if it's possible. I'd prefer another BCS (I've found that additional DPS would be more useful than tank) but that requires more CPU.
One thing I did realize was that I'd only trained HAM specialization to level 2. I'll be getting that up to level 4 over the next few days would should give me a 4% DPS boost. Real-life will probably keep me away from EVE until then.
3 fitting mods should not be necessary. Do this: try 7x arbalest HAM launchers and see if you can replace at least one fitting mod with a BCU. Then see if the limos launchers let you fit more, all the way down to meta1. Sometimes T2 isn't the best thing to fit if that requires fitting mods. The higher alpha and DPS boost from a damage mod can more than overcome the slight bonus of t2 missile launchers (the same doesn't always go for guns where specialized t2 ammo is *required* to do any damage at all).
Also remember to fit the 3% rof, damage and sig radius missile implants. Likewise look into powergrid & cpu implants. Even the 1% ones can make enough of a difference in being able to fit something and not.
Yeah, I am currently training up the skills needed to fly a broadsword. I created a plan in Evemon which I am following. It includes the skills needed for one of the more popular fits on battleclinic. It currently says 120 days, but I am heavily int/mem mapped at the moment, and plan on re-mapping once I finish with the int/mem skills needed (everything not int/mem has a base 5). And since there is a lot perception based, it should drasticly lower my time once I do that. In the mean time, I trained up enough to fit out a very good frigate and a decent cruiser and I am running missions to get some standings.
I think I'm 45 days away from remapping away from intelligence. I hink I'll post my stats when I do and let you guys take a look and make sure I'm not missing anything critical. Right now I train 2345/h so I want to get it done with that. Then its full perception for ships missiles and guns. Then in 2 years charisma lol
Take a couple of weeks inbetween and train the Hurricane to T2 Autocannons. That ship will likely be the most used ship you fly, and is relatively cheap to boot.
If you have missile skills, a Cyclone is a very nice ship as well. Again a very cheap self sufficient ship.
Just curious, how are you planning on financing your HICtor fleet? IMO a HICtor is a very specialized gang ship, and I'm failing to understand why you're choosing it as your first training target.
For the price of a rigged, well-fit hictor (let's call it 140M) you can lose *10* t2 fit, insured canes or harbs and closer to 12 drakes. Once again, IMO and coming from someone who treats lowec as flyover country between interesting desitations the great tank of a HICtor vs much more gank of a HAC or BC just means you'll die slower. Yes, you can scram from a trillion km away -- but so what? That's outside of web range and high DPS gun range.
I know that two people have posted that HICs aren't very useful in low sec, but I have to say that they are far more useful in a gang than a HAC. Rarely do I have a gang with out at least one HIC, and usually we have 2 or 3. They are better than just about any other ship at making sure your targets stay where you can kill them. ON the other hand, I usually ask HAC pilots to switch ships since their crap tank makes them next to useless in low sec. You can gank a frigate or a T1 cruiser that is crappily fit with one, but anything bigger than that and you will die from gate guns long before you finish the job. (plus they become a huge burden for our logistics, since the crap buffer requires us to prelock you in case you take fire - if we want to keep you alive.)
Now for solo hunting, a HAC is more useful, as it can actually kill something, and has enough speed to dictate range, but on a gate, where 95% of your fights will be in gang warfare, they are just an expensive glass cannon. The HIC is a great support ship in low-sec gang warfare. But they make horribad bait ships, since no-one will believe that a HIC would pilot alone though low-sec. A lone HIC just screams "BAIT".
Now, I agree that a BC is far more useful as an everyday ship, but I consider a HAC a bigger waste than a HIC for him if he plans on doing low-sec gang warfare. Yes it cost the same as a fully fitted and rigged BS, but so does any T2 Cruiser (HAC/Recon/Logi). It really comes down to what you want to do. If you want to solo quite a bit, then the HAC skills are where you want to go. If you want to be more useful in a fleet, then the HIC is a good choice. Most FC's would appreciate you even more if you could fly logistics, or at least experienced FC's.
Of course this is from someone who FCs a lot of small gangs through low-sec, and rarely does solo work. So those that solo more often will likely see the HAC is invaluable.
I should probably hook up with a lowsec pirate outfit long enough to figure out lowsec mechanics. My command ship pilot is equally at home behind the wheel of a HICtor or logistics boat for two races (as well as both flavors of command ships, t3, etc). But the mere thought of living in lowsec fills me with ennui.
That, and I remember the "fun" time I had grinding my sec status up after my last orgy of exhumer suicides and shudder.
I should probably hook up with a lowsec pirate outfit long enough to figure out lowsec mechanics. My command ship pilot is equally at home behind the wheel of a HICtor or logistics boat for two races (as well as both flavors of command ships, t3, etc). But the mere thought of living in lowsec fills me with ennui.
That, and I remember the "fun" time I had grinding my sec status up after my last orgy of exhumer suicides and shudder.
What's with the hate on lowsec?
You have no clue about life in low sec, obviously. You gain less lag, much less blobs, and people using interesting implants because of no bubbles. Much more small gang warfare and if you think that it is only 3 month old characters and/or pirates fighting each other (what is a "pirate", btw?), then I doubt you understand low sec pretty well.