I play a very tanky frigate. Mine is rank 6 (Tier 2) Empire. It has over 33,000 hit points with hull+shield. It is very slow, and I constantly have hull regeneration for me and my allies. I also like to use is the warp gate. It’s soooo useful. I use it to get into battle, and to escape.
Even if my ship dies, I often help in a huge way on the battlefield because 3 things are happening when I’m there
A) I’m healing all my allies
B) I’m dishing out tons of damage with 6 rapid fire pulse lasers.
C) Enemies start focusing on killing ME. And with 33K health + regen, it takes a long time.
Point C) is important, and it’s helped in many situations. this is because while enemies focus on the long job of killing me, it gives my teammates the chance to just destroy the enemy swarm. Even if I die, by the time I’m dead, the enemy team has lost more than 1 ship that was trying to kill me. Trading a handful of interceptors/fighters for 1 tanky frigate is usually a loss for the enemy, and helps us complete objectives.
Point C unfortunately doesn’t work for Fed frigs, as they have much weaker hull than Empire. Sounds like a decent strategy, I may give plasma another go.