Stealth bombers are a very specialized part of PvP. They can play many roles in all sorts of fleets, as scouts, damage dealers, or bombers. They are not very hard to train into, and it is always a plus to be able fly them, because they have so many uses. They are also used in “covert drop” gangs which we will get into later.
Before you decide which stealth bombers you should fly, you should know the pros and cons of each ship. There are four different stealth bombers, one for each race.
The Manticore, along with the hound, is one of the most widely used stealth bombers. It is so common mostly because the majority of EVE players are Caldari. It gains a bonus to kinetic missiles and bombs, and looks badass.
The hound is the top dog (hah!) of the stealth bomber group. It has a bonus to explosive damage, and because of that is most widely used. If you have not decided on a bomber to choose, choose this one.
This ugly ship is just like the hound, but it gets an EM bonus, great for killing drakes and shit.
This guy is also like the Manticore, but not as cool looking. It gets thermal bonuses.
Bombers (short for Stealth Bombers) can be used as glorified covert ops ships. You use a bomber the same for scouting as you would a covert op ship. I won't explain how to scout here, you can find that info here.
If you ever find yourself looking at a bunch of war targets, neutrals, or reds once you jump into a gate, the first thing you have to do is not panic. You have 30 seconds to evaluate your situation and come up with an escape plan.
AFK Cloaker is the act of flying into an unfriendly system, warping to a safe spot and cloaking for hours on end. It can make people more hesitant to rat or mine, even if your ship is not combat fit, which makes it a great psychological tactic.
As a more direct tactic, you can AFK Cloak in a system using a combat ship (such as a Heavy Assault Cruiser or Strategic Cruiser) wait an hour or so, use your Directional Scanner to look for people who are ratting or mining, then warp in for an easy kill. Its important to keep at max range, and burn away if the target tries to tackle you, you're looking for easy kills, not easy deaths.
To fit an SB you first need to know what you'll be doing with it. A stealth bomber has three main roles:
For scouting, only the Covert Ops Cloaking device is necessary. It's damn near impossible to catch a smart bomber pilot, and if you need to defend yourself on your own you're pretty much screwed anyway. Bombers are fragile; their only defenses are their small signature radii, high speed, and, of course, the ability to go into sneaky-mode at the touch of a button.
When you're in a fleet, a bomber can provide some welcome fire-support; with decent skills, one can put out the DPS of a battlecruiser or a poorly-fit battleship from a safe, comfortable range. For this, a sensor dampener can help if your victim decides that you're easy pickings, though most of the time you'll be left alone. A bomb launcher is rarely welcome in gate camps, since you'll be hitting your corpmates as well. However, a well-placed bomb or two is good for softening up a gate camp if your fleet plans to come by and break it up.
A must for a stealth bomber, besides the requisite three siege launchers, stealth module, and bomb launcher, are target painters. Just like the signature radius of turrets, explosives have explosion radii. If the explosion radius of your torpedo or bomb is greater than the signature radius of your target, it will experience a damage penalty.
Since target painters increase the signature radius of the painted target, most bomber pilots fit a couple target painters to maximize the effectiveness of their weapons.
The primary limiting factor in what you'll be able to fit is CPU output. Since missile launcher rigs increase the CPU need of launchers—and you'll want one or two for velocity and maybe one for damage, depending on your style—you may need to install a co-processor to deal with it. Your spare low slot should be reserved for a T2 ballistic control module.
Finally, you want an afterburner. Most battleships won't be able to track you at full tilt, and a MWD increases your signature radius, making you easy to lock.
You can check skill plans for bombers and other ships here.
Beside the requisite skills for a stealth bomber, you'll want the following at the very least to be an effective bomber pilot:
If you have a good deal of time to invest you could consider Torpedos V, Missile Launcher Operation V, and Torpedo Specialization I, giving you access to T2 torpedos, which are more specialized and cheaper than faction torpedos.