The Tengu series:
- Tengu Subsystems
- Fitting a Tengu
- Enjoying a Tengu
- The Salvage Tengu
Fitting a ship in Eve Online is a lot like playing with LEGO; things sometimes don’t fit, you get halfway through an edifice and realise it looks terrible, and scrounging for parts is part of the fun. However, when you build a spaceship out of LEGO, you can only blow up other people in your imagination. Score one for Eve.
However, there’s a few things to check before you undock for the first time…
Skills
To fly a Tengu, you need skills to be trained. Assuming you have the prerequisite support skills to fly a Caldari ship without embarrassing yourself, the only skills that are up for debate are the subsystem skills. I suggest that the minimum skill level required to fly a Tengu effectively is:
- Caldari Offensive Subsystems V
- Caldari Defensive Subsystems V
- Caldari Engineering Subsystems IV
- Caldari Electronics Subsystems IV
- Caldari Propulsion Subsystems IV
Offensive and defensive subsystems should be maxed because the most common mix of subsystems provide massive benefits for each level trained, so why not max them out.
You can limp along with engineering, propulsion and electronics subsystems at IV for a fair while, although you’ll eventually find that engineering subsystems at V is worth it for increasing your cap stability. Electronics subsystems V is mandatory if you’re probing or jamming but you can get away with less if you’re just shooting things. Similarly for propulsion systems – if your tank isn’t breaking on IV, then training to V can be left until later.
Granted, most people eventually skill all subsystems to V, so enough said about subsystem skills.
Rigs
You can swap the subsystems in and out of a Tengu, but you can’t detach the jury rigs without destroying them, so it’s important to choose wisely.
Most Tengu fits use the Accelerated Ejection Bay, which lacks a drone bay. This makes killing frigates an important consideration, since they’re also the ship classes most likely to web and warp scramble your ship, with tragic results. To combat this, a Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst or Flare Catalyst will mitigate the damage reduction frigates experience against heavy missiles. This is even more important when using Scourge Fury heavy missiles, which require assistance to even hit cruisers for full damage. Alternatively, a Bay Loading Accelerator will just pump more missiles at the target, killing faster via brute force, but chews up a lot of calibration points.
If you’re more concerned by tanking ability than DPS, then you’ll probably fit Capacitor Control Circuits instead – especially since your shield booster will be substantially larger than on a DPS fit.
Modules
With a ship as expensive as a strategic cruiser, it makes sense to fit faction modules where CPU or capacitor is tight. Of particular note are deadspace shield boosters, which are incredibly cap-efficient for their size and are often (ab)used in Tengu fits.
Now, onto some fits. I don’t claim these are optimal, but they’re representative of the sorts of popular fits that Tengus are configured for.
6-Launcher DPS Fit
[Tengu, pve slightly ganky]
Tengu Defensive – Amplification Node
Tengu Electronics – Dissolution Sequencer
Tengu Engineering – Augmented Capacitor Reservoir
Tengu Offensive – Accelerated Ejection Bay
Tengu Propulsion – Fuel Catalyst
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Heat Dissipation Field II
Domination Shield Boost Amplifier
Gistii B-Type Small Shield Booster
Y-S8 Hydrocarbon I Afterburners
Ballistic Deflection Field II
Gistii B-Type Small Shield Booster
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst II
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst II
Tank: 700 DPS Guristas
Gank: 700 DPS with my skills
Cap stable (just)
This fit is for anomalies, level 4 missions and general ratting, where you don’t need to tank excessively. For example, this fit can run a Serpentis Sanctum without needing the second shield booster active, but needs the second shield booster in Angel Sanctums.
Six launchers provide maximum offense but capacitor may be an issue. Note the judicious use of faction fittings to save on CPU enough to fit the dissolution sequencer. If you don’t want to bother, just fit a CPU efficiency gate and deal with the reduced targeting range.
This fit has dual small deadspace shield boosters, which are extremely cap-efficient and cheapish. You can swap one with another shield boost amp (or use the slot for a utility mid) if you want to go cheaper but still cap-efficient, or upgrade to a single Pith booster for additional tanking ability.
5 launcher tank fit
[Tengu, pve cheap tank]
Tengu Defensive – Amplification Node
Tengu Electronics – CPU Efficiency Gate
Tengu Engineering – Capacitor Regeneration Matrix
Tengu Offensive – Accelerated Ejection Bay
Tengu Propulsion – Gravitational Capacitor
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Caldari Navy Ballistic Control System
Ballistic Control System II
Capacitor Flux Coil II
Damage Control II
Domination Large Shield Booster
Caldari Navy Heat Dissipation Field
Domination Shield Boost Amplifier
Ballistic Deflection Field II
Ballistic Deflection Field II
Large Peroxide I Capacitor Power Cell
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst II
Medium Warhead Rigor Catalyst II
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Tank: 2000 DPS Guristas
Gank: 550DPS
Cap stable at 46%
This fit trades the sixth launcher for a huge capacitor, enabling the use of a large shield booster for a ridiculous amount of tanking. This fit should tank all Level 4 missions, provided the hardeners are adjusted accordingly.
Note the modules used for cap-stability – swapping in some capacitor rigs would make the fit less awkward if you wanted to roll with this fit all the time. Options with this fit involve using a cap booster instead of the cap-related modules, downgrading the shield booster size (or upgrading to a large deadspace booster) for cap stability, or just managing your capacitor by pulsing the shield booster.
W-space remote repair fit
[Tengu, shield rep]
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Damage Control II
Capacitor Power Relay II
Power Diagnostic System II
Caldari Navy Photon Scattering Field
Caldari Navy Photon Scattering Field
Invulnerability Field II
Invulnerability Field II
Large Shield Extender II
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Large S95a Partial Shield Transporter
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Tengu Defensive – Adaptive Shielding
Tengu Electronics – CPU Efficiency Gate
Tengu Engineering – Capacitor Regeneration Matrix
Tengu Offensive – Accelerated Ejection Bay
Tengu Propulsion – Intercalated Nanofibers
Tank: 1120 omni damage with 1 incoming shield rep
Gank: 480DPS
Cap stable at 45%
This fit would be used for buddy-pair Tengus in wormhole space. Cap warfare might be an issue, in which case the low slots can be altered to provide more cap buffer, or tech 2 rigs installed. Due to the nature of wormhole space, it’s generally not worth pimping it out too much.
Exploration
[Tengu, High Sec Probing]
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Pithi A-Type Small Shield Booster
Ballistic Deflection Field II
Invulnerability Field II
Codebreaker II
10MN Afterburner II
Pithum C-Type Magnetic Scattering Amplifier
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Heavy Missile
Sisters Expanded Probe Launcher, Sisters Core Scanner Probe I
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit I
Medium Gravity Capacitor Upgrade I
Tengu Defensive – Adaptive Shielding
Tengu Electronics – Emergent Locus Analyzer
Tengu Engineering – Augmented Capacitor Reservoir
Tengu Offensive – Accelerated Ejection Bay
Tengu Propulsion – Gravitational Capacitor
Tank: 240 DPS Omni
Gank: 505DPS (not using scourge fury)
Cap stable at 35%
This fit is from a friend’s exploration alt. He has this to say:
You can tweak it however to fit your wallet. e.g. Drop the expensive shield booster and passive EM hardener for 2 cheaper faction boosters. This fit works on the premise that you do Radar sites, otherwise you can drop the codebreaker too for a boost Amp. For me, this is also cap stable. I carry a EM Active hardener, Covert Subsystem and COCD in my hold for if I get a lowsec escalation.
What’s handy about exploration is that the modules you find can be used to pimp your Tengu further.
Travel
Obviously in Highsec you’re after a big buffer and good resists to prevent being alpha-striked on the Jita 4-4 undock, but elsewhere, you’ll want to take more stringent measures.
A fit dedicated to scouting and travel can be seen at Jester’s Trek.
Next up: how does it fly?
Talking to new players, I encounter many misconceptions and confusion surrounding the concept of Eve’s stacking penalty system. Some don’t understand what the stacking penalty does; many others do, but don’t see why it’s in the game. I’ll try to get everyone up to speed, but the second point will take up the bulk of this article.
Serpentine's Eve 
