Is Cobra mk5 op?
- Thread starter S0rkvild
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In the original, there was one ship you could fly - the Cobra III. That original was the first game I played with an analog stick, and "For the honor of Jameson" I'll never be without a cobra in my fleet
I understand how you feel, although in ED I had one early on & sold it to be able to afford another ship at the time, I rediscovered it (and a lot of the other cheaper ships) once I had my first Elite Rank (Combat) & really like it not just because of the legacy, but because it's a genuinely good ship that does things well & is charismatic to fly.
I'm in one right now, to give me some post-Cobra MkV trip context:
This specific hull is the one that got me to Trade Elite 16t at a time when the community wisdom was to grind it out in a T-9. It's done a bunch of CGs (last one was probably Sothis Gold) & been shot at but never downed more times than I can remember & is now one of my most used exobio ships along with an eagle & a Viper MkIV. And joining that short list of small pad exploration ships is the Cobra MkV.
It wan't for me. It's just that it's really good (not excellent) at everything you might want to do - properly-outfitted, it can do anything well, for its size. Because it's a small ship, it's fast too, which means the I-like-roller-coasters community will always keep it close to their hearts.
It doesn't break the game, but it does change the game. I don't think waiting until it's generally available will hurt you - or your CMDR's - progress in the universe.
Meh the game had already changed. I remember when the Vulture & FDL were added & they changed the game. Before them we essentially had a few good, useful ships to progress through (Sidey, Cobra MkIII, AspS, Python & Conda, maybe a couple of others, the Eagle & Viper come to mind) then a load of 'flavour' ships that NPCs would use but we could too like the Orca & T-6/7/9. Then we got a pair of power starved combat ships that were excellent.
In 1.5/2.0 (same update) we got a load more flyable NPC flavour ships (AspS is the perfect example but the Cobra MkIV & to a much lesser extent the Viper IV) and the Cutter & Vette top tier combo, game changers for combat & trade respectively (the T-9 would later be significantly upgraded to be more competitive on trade).
The Chieftain & other introduced the idea of easy to fly combat ships to medium pads, eating into the Vulture's advantage, every round of ships has changed the game.
These latest ones being well suited to SCO is a nice touch but the idea that a ship, any ship can rotate in any axis really well instead of being largely yaw restricted has slowly crept in too, so have better & better jump ranges, boost speeds, internal module flexibility.
I've not flown the Mandalay but my understanding is that the Cobra MkV handles pretty similarly & has similar strengths (tough, fast etc). It's built for the modern customerbase while still providing more variety for the existing & longer standing fans.
I mean sure, if the Cobra MkIV or Asp Scout had been this good back in 2016 they would have been massively OP go-to ships but they weren't, they were crap then & they're still pretty bad no matter how you engineer or outfit them. But in 2025 these new ships will be popular without making the older ships obselete, they'll still be there for fun & variety just as they always have been.
I'm not a fan of power creep but I understand why it happens. Move with the times imo.
I have each of the med sized SCO-ready ships. Bases covered. Those 3 and a mining fit KII are my entire fleet. Med ships, like small ships, can go everywhere, so I don't see an advantage to small ships. I do see the attraction to small pad ships though. The Vulture had been pretty good to me. I agree that as new ships were developed and released, the previous ships could and did loose their place in the pecking order. That is the way of progress, I'm ok with that. After ten years a new meta isn't a terrible idea. I am excited for more new ships even if they do creep along.
The OG Elite on my C64 blew my mind at the time. It was ugly as sin and ran at what, 10fps or less? But my young brain filled out the immersion gaps with imagination, as with many other games of that time. The ship's shape was uniquely different compared to other spaceship designs back then so it was great to see the high res version of it in ED so many years later.
That's only part of it though. When I slowly moved through the ship progression in the early ED days, the Cmk3 was the first ship that felt like a "grown up" one without breaking the bank.
Unlike many other players, I also really like the cockpit with its off centre position and the single (unfortunately still empty) passenger's seat next to me. It made me feel like a man in a space van as it is a good multirole ship for its size, and that flexibility gave me ample opportunity to play around with it for different roles, from combat to mining to AX. I also think that the flight model feels the most "just right" out of all of the other ships, regardless of size.
And especially with Odyssey's release and the new on foot player perspective, its dimensions appear reasonable still, unlike other ships that seem way out of proportion. Not just the medium or large ships, but even small pad ones like the Courier as well. The Cobra on the other hand I could imagine being that exact size if it existed IRL.
The C3 to me feels like the ship they designed first, and went on to the rest afterwards.
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Type 6 doesn’t have to be obsolete by the cobra mk v, just needs a slight remodelling to fit small pads, seems like it was always meant to be a small ship but was too tall.
It makes a great exploration ship too.
I fly ships because I like them. Like my exploration Python. I just really love the Python and have like 8 set for different purposes lol. Meta has never interested me.
Do love the Mandalay though.
It makes a great exploration ship too.
I fly ships because I like them. Like my exploration Python. I just really love the Python and have like 8 set for different purposes lol. Meta has never interested me.
Do love the Mandalay though.
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Yes, the T6 can make for a great early exploration ship. It's the T8, not the Cobra 5, that renders it obsolescent.
How? It’s not even remotely in the same price range. Type 6 hull is a little over 1 million, type 8 is over 38 million.
True, but that's less than a few days gameplay, nowadays. I clean saved a little while back, and I had no difficulty getting up to an Anaconda in two weeks.
Either that or parody Mambo #5 as "Cobra Mark V"
Shirley that's reserved for the Mamba 5.
In the original, there was one ship you could fly - the Cobra III. That original was the first game I played with an analog stick, and "For the honor of Jameson" I'll never be without a cobra in my fleet
/yorkshireman
You had a joystick? You had it easy! We just had a keyboard!! Not even a mouse!!! And we loved it!
(although I did buy a joystick for my Apple //e after a couple of months. I think it was Sundogs that inspired me to buy a mouse too.)
BBC Micro, Baby... the original Acorn RISC machine. Which came with the original D-15 analog gameport for a stick
C-64.BBC Micro, Baby... the original Acorn RISC machine. Which came with the original D-15 analog gameport for a stick
both would be great. I'm forced to Overchange my PP instead of armoured.Why power plant? Bigger distro is more useful.
But having both would be very OP.
If you have shields, overcharged is just fine. If you are shieldless, armoured is more than enough.
Oh wow, somehow I always forget that the Beeb had analog-joystick capability. Flying with just a digital joystick added a bit of spice toBBC Micro, Baby... the original Acorn RISC machine. Which came with the original D-15 analog gameport for a stick
(ZX Spectrum, Kempston Competition Pro...)And I hadn't heard the 6502 called a RISC CPU before. Turns out there's been a debate raging for decades about it being RISC/CISC/neither!
[edit to fix brain-fade-related typo
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