This ship can basically withstand any small part operation better than any other Caldari frigate. It’s shields are though, the armaments are strong, and most importantly for a small ship, it is a speedy little guy!

The Merlin is my trusty little ship whenever I need to go behind enemy lines. It will go super fast and have an incredible damage output. Fitted with 2 rocket launchers and 2 light neutron blasters, it can turn almost any other frigate into dust. The shield capacity isn’t too bad either. The ship can take quiet the beating from other ships while still standing to send out it’s lethal weaponry.

But who can really hit it when it is flying at speeds of 2000 meters per second? I really enjoy this frigate as a fast and cheap tackler, but the problem with it is that the powergrid is just a tiny bit small to get the whole thing fitted to your desires. A few skills like engineering and such should help get that extra one or two megawatts you might need.

The ship should always be fully fitted with weapons and for PvP purposes, it should have some speed boosters, for example, an afterburner, microwarpdrive, overdrive injector, nanofiber, or inertia stabilizer. And if you are a PvE monkey, fit your weapons, a small shield booster, and 2 shield boost amplifiers. If you need that extra power to get those squeezed in, throw on two power diagnostic systems in the low slots.

Now this frigate can match whatever its foes throw at it!

[expand title=Technical Information:]

• 5% bonus to shield resistances
• 10% bonus to small hybrid turret optimal range
• Default targeting range is 30 km with 4 locked targets
• Velocity is 230 m/sec with 0 m3 of drone capacity
• Shield hit points is 469 and recharges in 625 seconds
• Power grid is at 35MW, 175ft of CPU, and 400 calibration points
• There are 4 high slots, 4 medium slots, 2 low slots, and 3 rig slots
• 2 slots for launchers and 2 for turrets[/expand]

[expand title=Close-Orbiting Merlin:]

• 2 Light Neutron Blaster
• 2 Rocket Launcher

• 1 1mn MicroWarpdrive
• 2 Cap Recharger

• 2 Overdrive Injector[/expand]

[ratings]

Remember the day when 7 capital ships, 7 carriers, were lost by Quam Singulari?

Those 7 capitals went down with the help of 80 to 90 hostile ships. If you tried to go get a glimpse of the action, that would have been all you got; a glimpse, before you were sent back to your clone.

The lag at the time was utterly terrible. Just for me to jump into the Tama system meant waiting 5 minutes on the Nourvukaiken side of the gate for it to hurl my ship into the action. When my screen became interactable again, i found myself about 10,000km away from the so-epic-battle.

So I war to 0 on the gate in case I had to make a dashing escape from any flashing reds shooting at me. The screen stutters and lags as we move closer to the star gate. In a few quick seconds, just enough time for 2 screen shots, I find myself back in Todaki where my clone is installed. Well that was fun, I guess?

Didn’t really see much, but that’s okay. The 2 screen shots aren’t bad after some detailed examining.

Later on that day I joined another fleet of 70 ships, ranging from shuttles to battleships. Our objective was to engage a group of gate campers that was about 30 ships big. But when we got there, the intel changed.

About 10 more ships arrived. Thinking that it was no biggie, we engaged and managed to destroy a few Dominixes and Megathrons before 3 carriers managed to cyno in. We couldn’t dent their shields very much so it was time to retreat and move to another system and regroup. Now if they wanted to cyno in again, we would know and they would have needed to use about 80% of their capacitor, rendering them vulnerable.

At this time, I needed to go, so I left the fleet and headed back to Nourvukaiken with my Merlin. As I safely dock back into my station, I thought about the days’ encounters and realized I saw about 10 capital ships. Not bad.

But seriously, Tranquility really needs some upgrades.

On 23:13:00 EVE time, a fleet of about 60 State Protectorate pilots engaged an enemy fleet of about 50 pilots, or so we had thought. Once we got there, about another 30 to 50 ships jumped in through and lagged us up.

This is what the fleet started out like, about 90 people.

Our plan was to go around back door from the Caldari high security space into Tama. There was hostiles in the only Tama station and we wanted to trap them inside and snipe/kill them off. 10 minutes later and we arrive. Things didn’t go so well because there was a neutral spy following us and another spy in our fleet. Most of the people inside that station escaped. We started to chased them down and was able to pick off one or two.

Later, we reach Heydieles and our recon says a fleet is parked on the Old Man Star to Villore. We decide to go after these guys and got the fleet ready. By that time when we got to the destination, we only had a little above half of the people remaining.

The battle was not the best I have ever had. It lagged like hell! I did not appreciate it because you would always target the wrong thing or shoot at something that wasn’t there anymore. Everyone zoomed out to try to reduce the lag, but more reinforcement ships just keep jumping in from the Gallente side. Now we were just trying to get those that we could.

Our fleet commander was still calling the primary targets, and we were able to successfully take some ships down. In the end, I helped to kill these guys:

• Victim: Kadean
• Location: Old Man Star
• Corp: Elite Underworld Special Forces
• Alliance: None
• Ship: Dominix [Fitting]

• Victim:Parmenides Elea
• Location: Old Man Star
• Corp: Wrath of Fenris
• Alliance: None
• Ship: Dominix [Fitting]

• Victim:Lucas Avignon
• Location: Old Man Star
• Corp: Avignon Associates Inc.
• Alliance: None
• Ship: Dominix [Fitting]

If you want to see my full kill board, please visit here.

Here is to the cool people that stuck it to the end, I salute you!

Corewin, CRUSH BOSS, Cuthbert Drake, Ecky Ptang, Kazabet, Lord Erebos, Marcuz Griffin, Ray Rosny, sakura okami, Splunk jamma, Tzu Wu, and Xanath Fireheart

Gallery, enjoy!

As time passes, I will be writing more reviews for these ships. They include the:

• Ferox; hybrid eh? [In progress]
• Caracal; the Drake’s little brother. [In progress]
• Merlin; it’ll provide the pew pew.
• Kestrel; free missiles for everyone! [In progress]

Sorry if they are all Caldari ships, but those are the ones that I have piloted.

But if you are able to provide reviews, send me an email at tonglil@hotmail.com!

Stay tuned for moar!