One thing that I have learned prior to soloing L4 missions for surviving Security missions (i.e. pve combat) is that how you decide to tank the missions in the first place. When I started running security missions I decided that I would run an armor tank using an active tank at first and then a more veteran player suggested that I switch to a passive tank so that when I was capacitor neutralized, I wont lose my ship right away. To support this though I needed to train my armour related skills to a level (3 or 4) high enough that I could then concentrate on my other skills while running missions. And as a result as I survived the missions and completed them my faction standing increased to the point now that if I so choose I could transit to low sec and run L5 missions, but I decided that staying in High Sec was more profitable by salvaging (and looting) L4 Security missions and including bounties and rewards.
IF you also train the relevant compensation skills to max level, you will achieve a maximum of 25% increase to the associated damage type. An example would be a base passive armour tank using a megathron… the hull starts with 10% protection against explosive armor damage and you add a basic energized explosive membrane which provides a -30% bonus for explosive protection the resistance for Explosive Damage will jump to 37.0% with an untrained exp comp skill (lvl 0). At Level 1 for the Explosive Armor Compensation Skill you get a 5% increase to the Explosive resist and for every additional level of the skill that you train you get an additional 5% per level up to level 5 for a total of 25% additional protection.
In some cases you can add an armor pump to the rigs that you use to adjust for any holes that the ship modules that you are using to offset the different damage type combinations, but if you are using an omni-tank (i.e. all damage) use an anti-explosive pump and energized armor nano membranes to achieve a 75% damage resistance on each damage type (EM, Kinetic, Thermal, and Explosive).
For a Shield Tank, I believe that the same principal will apply with respects to Damage Type Resistance(s). For this can a shield tanker verify this for me.
By the way, depending on the type of the ship you decide to use, pay attention to the description and traits of the ship will also provide a bonus in the protection of that ship as well
You only need to worry about neuts if you’re fighting Blood Raiders, in which case you should also consider weapons that don’t require capacitor (projectile or missile) .
Otherwise, an active armor tank has advantages - no impact on your speed or signature radius, making your ship harder to hit. For a basic, 3-slot tank I use an EANM, reactive hardener and armor repair.
The OP has a good write up of armor tanking. I would agree that the Reactive Armor Hardener is another tool in the set. It’s weakness is Omni-damage, but if you know you’ll be in a situation that only requires two, or even one damage type, the RAH is excellent.
IIRC, it doesn’t have stacking penalty, but you can only fit one. During times that I occasionally tank only one damage type, I’ve seen the RAH automatically adjust, causing my resist to go from about 75% to approaching 90%, going from 1/4 incoming damaging all the way down to almost 1/10th, which is pretty sweet.
I had forgotten about that piece of equipment. I will say that most times I am using dual purpose battleships (i.e. L4 Missions and Incursions) due to the fact that I have spent a lot of my incursion payout back into my hulls that finding an additional use for them is necessary for when I cant run incrusions.
I logged in yesterday and I noticed that TDF wasn’t up and running due to low availability of hisec incursions.
BTW, using a full hi-grade slave set allows me to use the lopwr slot required for an armor plate for either a fed navy magstab or a republic te.
The Slave Set of implants provides an additional 50% (I think my math is right with regards to the hp bonus) on top of lvl 5 armor skills to the hull of my ship.
So I think you are focused on battleships ? your post entirely omits any sort of speed or sig tanking. You do realize that battleships are sub par for L4s over a long term average right ?
You gotta realize that most L4s will not be the huge ones like Pirate Scarlet or Angel Extravaganza etc. they will be middle sized or even very small, on the small end you get missions like The Duo of Death for example.
Anytime you use a ship or fit in which you have to dock up to change hardeners or something between missions due to rat types, you’re not doing it right. You should be omni tanked from the get go.
When you factor in different size missions and how often you travel between them then using a faction cruiser or T3C or even one of the battlecruisers or command ships become a much better options.
It is not uncommon to fly a cruiser with 900-1000 DPS on it and which lets you simply go from mission to mission without the necessity of docking up and refitting.