She's a beauty! (New ship revealed--Mandalay)

[Hank]

You mean long legs like landing gear? or long legs like in the pilot world speak of a lot of distance per tank of gas?

I meant long base jump range but since the T8's had a few issues with the SRV clearing the bottom of the ship, I'd say landing gear height needs to be studied.

Fuel consumption, capacity, scooping, etc. will be fine tuned with outfitting and engineering. Have a great day

 

[Cmdr. Numa]

Cockpit with non-existant downwards view on a new exploration ship really makes me facepalm, especially after the AspE and later the Phantom even better got it right. The orientation over ground in a Krait is without parallel. Well, my Mandalay will never land on a planet, it will live in supercruise, honk, FSS and map. The 45° down option is fine....unless you carry a bulky undercarriage scraping the ground, which reminds me of the dragons in House of the Dragon. Putting a sleek bird on top of a blocky tripod looks terrible. But it'll have the sweet SCO optimization, making exploring secondary stars much less of a chore. My exobiology ship will stay the Sidey however, which does also pretty well with the SCO.

 

[Michael Ryan]

Excelt if you are flying 45 degree this "bulky undercarriage" is less problematic than flying horizontally. I like how Frontier try not to create any meta-ship. Brilliant move.

 

[Jack Brolin]

Honestly I think the restricted cockpit view is fine, it prevents the AspX from becoming obsolete. Balance innit. I always found the Mamba cockpit a nice place to be though. And the view out is great...as long as you don't want to look down.

 

[tolm]

With the facts we have so far I am going for 4xC4 and armour/hull strength at Cutter levels, jump range thanks to the class 8 FSD.


I would point out that the downward view of all the ships in the game is less than impressive due to the huge dashboard etc, yes you can get glimpses down and to the sides but in level flight they are just glimpses.

Someone said inverted flight which actually worked quite well until thrusters changed.

So is it going to be the best in game probably not, is it going to be worse than an Anaconda definitely not, is it going to be better than my current main explorer a Hauler probably.

If it gets 4x C4 weapons … which I think would be a unique loadout? … and assuming a C6 or even C7 slot intended for a Fuel Scoop but that could instead carry the shield … well, that would make quite the “hunter killer” to relentlessly pursue your foes across the galaxy … but even something like 2x C2 or 3x C1 combined with 2x C3 would be enough to reliably defend yourself whilst running missions.

Personally, I really hope they do give it some decent weapon options plus enough internals to also carry collector limpets … it could be a perfect little PvE mission runner for non-wing combat, scan, salvage, courier missions … maybe even Odyssey transport.

Yes, there are already ships that do that well (currently using a Phantom) but none of them have the Mamba cockpit!!

If it does turn out that way it will be the first of the new ships I will pay for early access for.

 

[Shir]

Views are a big part of exploration gameplay. Even without VR, I look right and left all the time while flying the Asp Explorer, it's just one key press, then you press it again and recenter.

The thing about atmospheric flight will probably be better thrusters or mobility, which are both needed now that exobiology makes you spend more time on planets (as are decent shields). I've tried some high G landings with my usual explorers (having started Odyssey only recently), even went to that 45g world, and I think thrusters are weaker in Odyssey making landing and taking off in high G more difficult.

Weapons wise, I only outfit a mining laser on exploring ships..

 

[tolm]

Honestly I think the restricted cockpit view is fine, it prevents the AspX from becoming obsolete. Balance innit. I always found the Mamba cockpit a nice place to be though. And the view out is great...as long as you don't want to look down.

They could update the Mamba cockpit in this ship with some floor-windows …

 

[Red Anders]

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley Mandalay again.

(Sorry if somebody already did that gag - this is only a driveby post lol)

 

[Sublime]

Weapons wise, I only outfit a mining laser on exploring ships..

A plasma slug weapon is also handy if you need to dump fuel.

 

[St0rmFury]

A plasma slug weapon is also handy if you need to dump fuel.

With SCO drives, that will no longer be necessary

 

[Kira Goto]

With SCO drives, that will no longer be necessary

To be fair, the plasma slug will be a lot more controllable. I would think so, at least, not that I’ve ever been in any situation where I would have needed to use it in a build to reach a particularly distant system.

(But I have also not gone fringe hunting, so, yeah.)

 

[DjVortex]

The thrusters ruin the whole look. All Zorgon-Peterson ships have beautiful thrusters, even on the Lightning jet that this positioning of thrusters is based on - they're covered. Not on the Mandalay, here they look like an afterthought.

They had to make the ship handle SCO drives well, so some compromises in visual design are to be expected.

(Yes, thrusters are a fundamental part of FSD supercruise. Try disabling them while in supercruise and you'll see.)

 

[Cmdr. Numa]

Honestly I think the restricted cockpit view is fine, it prevents the AspX from becoming obsolete. Balance innit. I always found the Mamba cockpit a nice place to be though. And the view out is great...as long as you don't want to look down.

The AspX became obsolete (as an explorer) when the Phantom entered the scene. Now the Phantom weeps, as all that prevents it from staying the best explorer is that SCO optimization.

 

[angusmadmac1]

I think it depends on what you or I expect on a ship , this ship doesn't scream explorer it's looks more of a planetary fighter. I like the way that ship design is going but think " aw fur coat and nae knickers " . But keep it going Fdev. I won't swap my dolphin explorer . So 1 fighter python MK2 , 1 trader mk8 and 1 "explorer" all we have left is either 1 med imperial or some fancy looking passenger ?? I hope it's an imperial

 

[Doctor Dread]

So 1 fighter python MK2 , 1 trader mk8 and 1 "explorer" all we have left is either 1 med imperial or some fancy looking passenger

A huuge trader.
Mk8 is medium, contestant to OG Python.

Or it'll be a Cobra 5, for the Swiss Army Knife category.

 

[Cmdr. Numa]

4th ship this year is a Saud Kruger medium, I'm pretty certain about that. What we get next year ? No idea.

 

[Ashnak]

Its a medium ship that can compete on range with the Annie (apparently)

O7

Medium pad? With those wings? Interesting.

 

[Shurimal]

Or it'll be a Cobra 5

Yes, please! It's hard to improve perfection, but improved SCO handling, 4 utility slots and stronger base shield strength while keeping all else the same would be bonkers.

 

[Ashnak]

I like things. \o/

I'm actually going to call mine Mandy. Because my cat ! Mandy helps me fly (into things). She is my little furry copilot.

Flimley

 

[Doctor Dread]

Yes, please! It's hard to improve perfection, but improved SCO handling, 4 utility slots and stronger base shield strength while keeping all else the same would be bonkers.

It can be even simpler.

Take Mk IV, keep it exactly as she is, just gave her improved SCO handling. Everybody's happy.

Old owners of Mk IV for ED keeping their promise "only now, exclusive, as our 'thank you' for your financial help when we needed it", and all the rest who cry for this one toy they missed and can't have. Voila, all above will be satisfied, FDevs will have an easy job in making "new" ship, and will cash in on the presale of Cobra Mk V.

Frankly, ED would be dumb not to do so.