Subsecond Ships in EVE Online
Brief mechanics primer for context. Skip to Definitions if you already know how warping works.
When warp is initiated, a ship accelerates until 75% of its max velocity is directed to within ~15 degrees of its destination, then it enters warp if it isn't tackled.
The time this takes is called the ship's align time. It is measured from a dead stop because pre-existing velocity alters warp mechanics. These things affect align time.
Ships enter warp at the ends of the server's 1 hz ticks, i.e. at the end of every clock second.
Therefore, if warping from a dead stop, all align times between 2 seconds flat and 2.999 seconds are functionally identical.
Definitions
A ship instawarps if its align time is between 1 and 1.999 seconds. Instawarp ships avoid most tacklers but can be caught by hyper- or ultralockersspecialist tacklers with very high scan resolution
and proximity to London.
Subsecond ships, you guessed it, have align times under 1 second. While a great many ships in EVE can be made to instawarp, only a few dozen or so can go subsecond.
Warp Mechanics in Specific Situations
Subsecond ships can always escape hyperlockers in these situations (assuming no bubbles or lances are involved):
- they warp from under jump cloak
- they warp out of the tether provided by a structure
- warping out of tether is completely safe in any ship, provided you don't break tether (by locking anything or activating an offensive module) or leave tether range while the ship aligns
- they undock from a station and warp to a destination no more than ~15 degrees from their undock vector before their 30-second Location Change Timer expires
- station undock warp-offs, if not too far off-angle from the randomized undock vector, and assuming you don't bump or get bumped, are, tmk, infallible in any ship, not just subsecond ones
In this situation, anecdotal evidence suggests most ships—subsecond or not—can reliably avoid hyperlockers, but I don't know of any conclusive proof/disproof:
- they either activate a covert cloak in their decloak tick or correctly use the cloak-MWD trick on a hull and fitting which can actually do itsome fits simply cannot execute the cloak trick (see how to tell if a fit can cloak trick here)
- this could be disproven by a hyperlocker uncloaking an aligned ship & warping it away on one client and managing to lock it on another
- anecdotally: I bypassed inveterate hyperlocker Yasaro ~20 times with a covert cloak, but they caught me twice in an instawarping interceptor (evidence of hyperlocking)
- I never risked trying to avoid him via the cloak + MWD trick, though, so I don't have any anecdotal evidence about how that fares against hyperlockers
- the cloak-MWD trick is more dangerous than a covert cloak for two reasons:
- firstly, there's timing involved and thus it's easier to fuck up
- hyperlockers are also very likely to successfully burn at noncovert cloak-tricking hulls & decloak them before they build up enough speed to escape
- the reliability of cloaks in the face of hyperlockers is (anecdotal) evidence that gate and activated cloaks (and undock invuln, if unstopped) grant an extra tick of unlockability
However, subsecond ships cannot always escape hyperlockers in these situations:
- they undock, stop their shipControl + Space, by default, come to a halt, then warp off (2014 evidence, 2022 evidence, discussion)
- note: as discussed, stopping one's ship does not break undock invulnerability but does seem to remove the one extra tick of unlockability one gets if entering warp straight from invuln
- they warp to a grid, slow to a halt, then warp off
- they leave a ship—either in a subsecond frigate (from a battleship's Escape Bay) or in a podaka capsule, the egg-shaped ship
your pilot is in if not in a ship, either manually (via ejecting) or because it was destroyed—then warp off
- pods and subsecond frigates emerging from destroyed ships may or may not have the extra tick of warp invuln, but I suspect not
In this situation, I assume—given the logic of the above—that subsecond ships cannot reliably avoid hyperlockers, but I dunno if this could be conclusively proven or disproven:
- they have no undock invulnerability but are doing 75% or more of max velocity and activate warp to a destination within 15 degrees of their current alignment
- it's a question of timing: if the hyperlocker initiates lock at the earliest moment after the target has initiated warp, what happens? and how could this even be reliably demonstrated?
- this is extremely academic, of course, but... in for a penny, I guess...
Subsecond-Capable Hulls
Here are the three cheapest subsecond fits I know, at ~110, ~230 and ~260 million ISK (drugged, implantless and undrugged, respectively) as of August 2024.
You can almost certainly make better fits; that was just quick tinkering. pyfa is fun to play with.
These ships can all go subsecond. Pods are subsecond regardless of pilot skill.
These all need at least Inertial Stabilizers (usually faction) and either an EM-70[x] implant or Quafe Zero Green Apple. Most also need Nomad implants and maybe Low-Friction Nozzle Joints:
- Astero—covert cloakycan fit a Covert Ops cloak, which can be
activated during warp
- Atron
- Chremoas—covert cloaky, nullican fit an Interdiction Nullifier, which allows
temporary bypassing of interdiction bubbles, SESpecial Edition, a ship rewarded by CCP in small
numbers, sells for at least twelve figures
- Damavik
- Daredevil
- Dramiel
- Federation Navy Comet
- Hecate
- Hydra—covert cloaky, nulli, SE
- Imp—nulli, SE
- Jackdaw—a fit near the bottom of this page is likely the best low-volume subsecond hauler/taxi for HS/LS
- Metamorphosis—covert cloaky
- Nergal
- Raiju—SE
These can go subsecond but also require Halcyon G, which is no longer readily available, or a one-per-character account-bound AIR boosterAIR Agility Booster II, given once to any character
which makes 100 stargate jumps, or a limited-time agility-boosting event drug:
- Ares—nulli
- Executioner
- Garmur
- Geri—SE
- Gold Magnate—SE
- Imperial Navy Slicer
- Malice—SE
- Silver Magnate—SE
- Sunesis