Opinions and such on "asps"

[Nemes]

Hey all ^

After grinding for ages in my type6 to save some coin for either a "vulture or an "asp" I decided to go for an asp as I plan to to do allot of everything or a while in game now.............
ie..... bounty hunting, cargo runs, explorations, pirating and so on.
As yet i havent decided if I want to go for a particular faction etc

My quesions are - what do people think of the asp in terms of...
a = exploration ship
b = pvp combat ship
c - semi cargo ship - IE I know its not optimized for cargo space but it can hold a fair but next to say type 3 or a viper etc.

Is my shiny new asp worth gearing up to the max or should i just medium gear it and keep saving for something bigger.

Nemes

 

[Vingtetun]

It's the ship equivalent of a swiss army knife. It even has that doohickey for getting stones out of horse's hooves.

You can set it up with reasonable weapon loadout, a 6A shield, max out on the equipment (point defence, k warrant, adv disco scanner, surface scanner OR some cargo space if you prefer), a shield cell and then you have a perfect multi role ship with no worries about power.

Excellent for exploration, pretty handy for combat, great for scooping up whatever your target drops and flogging to boost your profits.

I've used one for ages and it really is a good little ship.

 

[bigmuthatrukka]

As an explorer it excels, in pvp prepare to see lots of insurance screens. Despite what some people say, the asp is an awful fighter, purely because it can't take much punishment. As a hauler it is about the same as the T6. But has teeth to deter an opportunist. If you want to have a punch up, vulture all the way. If you want to do anything else the flying lawnmower is a sound investment.

 

[shadragon]

The Asp is a large target in profile, but does do a lot of things and is Sterling at many.

6 hardpoints is a good start and very long jump range. Great rares trader.

 

[sbdags]

If you are bounty hunting or pvp then the Vulture is king. The Asp is relatively weak as a fighter.

 

[Sendraks]

Exploration - excellent
Trader - an expensive alternative to the T6, but better armed and handles better.
Rares Trading - as per trader.
RES Farming - an ok choice. Expensive to fit to get performance that's still not quite as good as the vulture.
PvP - Nope.
In ancient tombs - very dangerous. You go first.

 

[NickTheGrey]

My quesions are - what do people think of the asp in terms of...

a = exploration ship

I haven't used my Asp as an explorer vessel yet. I did most of my exploration in a Cobra. From what I've read on the forums, though, you'll find an Asp with a decent Frame Shift Drive invaluable when it comes to crossing larger distances between stars in deep (deep!) space.

b = pvp combat ship

Ever since getting the Hell beaten out of my new Asp by a player recently I've been working on getting sharper teeth for it. I think the Asp would be a very capable PvP choice but you'll need to make sure it is well armed and armoured before you take it anywhere near combat with another player.

c - semi cargo ship - IE I know its not optimized for cargo space but it can hold a fair but next to say type 3 or a viper etc.

My Asp isn't optimised for cargo / trade at all but I do have 52T of space which certainly isn't harming my efforts at the moment. I read a lot on the forums about having different ships for different roles, ("I feel like trading today, I'll get my Type 9" or "I'm in a foul mood, time to bust out my warship!") but I prefer to keep the same ship and have it work all roles. Because you never know when an opportunity is going to present itself and you don't want to travel x light years to collect another ship.

Is my shiny new asp worth gearing up to the max or should i just medium gear it and keep saving for something bigger.

I say gear it up. It's a lot of cash to do properly but done right I think it's a very capable ship. And don't forget, you can part exchange your current ship against something bigger!

 

[Therinfluffs]

You forgot another role it can fill.

Put some buns on it and make it an Aspburger.

 

[CMDR Derrida]

If you are bounty hunting or pvp then the Vulture is king. The Asp is relatively weak as a fighter.

Disagree, the ASP is BRILLIANT for pvp! : a 'shotgun' ASP with A6 shields, A0 Boosters and lots of shield cells (costing around 42 million credits) will kick most vulture's asses. The all cannon loadout fired at once acts like a faster more accurate version of a 'huge' hardpoint cannon. The way you can put four pips to shields pretty much permanently while firing at your opponent (the gimbled cannons still do plenty of damage through chaff) make this loadout almost an exploit - a regular giant killer. See Z4Mafia's youtube channel for thorough illustration of this point.

 

[TriumphANT]

For exploration, nothing can touch it. That HUGE tank means you can go about 1000Ly without scooping in Economy mode around normally packed stars. It's really that good.
PvP combat. It's fast at boosting, but the 6 hardpoints don't give quite the ooomph of a Vulture, and power/heat management means you'll be compromising to an extent. It also has a massive flat hull size. If you've ever been in a fight against one, you'll never miss it at close range. For PvP you need a dedicated fighter I'm afraid, but it's good for running away!
Cargo is pretty excellent. 100T or so, so you can do the big rares runs with almost a full load for about 1.25M per run and normal trading is good too. Similar to a T6 with teeth, and again the jump range and fuel tank make it formidable for multi-jump trading.
Overall I love the Asp. It's old school compared to the Clipper or Vulture, but mega versatile and has plenty of module/utility slots, so fitting a KWS and a fuel scoop, or kitting it out for its original purpose is a dawdle.

 

[Canasta]

It's the ship equivalent of a swiss army knife. It even has that doohickey for getting stones out of horse's hooves.

You can set it up with reasonable weapon loadout, a 6A shield, max out on the equipment (point defence, k warrant, adv disco scanner, surface scanner OR some cargo space if you prefer), a shield cell and then you have a perfect multi role ship with no worries about power.

Excellent for exploration, pretty handy for combat, great for scooping up whatever your target drops and flogging to boost your profits.

I've used one for ages and it really is a good little ship.

The word doohickey was officially withdrawn from the English language in 1979 and its use is no longer legal. Please refrain from using it in future

 

[Rubbernuke]

If you can protect its very fragile powerplant its a potent fighter, just be aware of its large profile.

Personally I think its the best all round ship in the game, just edging the Cobra.

 

[Nemes]

cheers guys and gals

i Think I'll stick with my asp for a while - Its a good looking ship too which helps.
I did try a vulture for a while before I traded it in - and it was nice and fast - also felt like I was in something high tech and high range as the chockpit window layout is brilliant in looks --- but just thge 2 HEAVY haevy hardpoints put me right off its need a 3rd hardpoit at the vry least.

PS...

1 more question ^^
In this previous sentance from someone who replied to my origial post - what does the "res" abbreviation mean...????
((((( RES Farming - an ok choice. Expensive to fit to get performance that's still not quite as good as the vulture. )))))

 

[Thasarion]

It is a very good multipurpose ship for it's price. Go to EDshipyard.com and you can see the multipurpose usages with it. Although, I would go for the Vulture until you have enough to get a Type-7, fill it's huge hold, and still have enough for insurance. If you get a good RES spawn in a vulture with a kill scanner, you can bring in about 4,000,000 in a few hours.

 

[CMDR Derrida]

PvP combat. It's fast at boosting, but the 6 hardpoints don't give quite the ooomph of a Vulture, and power/heat management means you'll be compromising to an extent. It also has a massive flat hull size. If you've ever been in a fight against one, you'll never miss it at close range. For PvP you need a dedicated fighter I'm afraid, but it's good for running away!

It's also extremely good for fighting brilliant players in Vultures...and winning:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7CM4kKilzo

 

[The Natoorat]

Asp looks like a frog that has been stepped on. Ugly thing.
Had it once, but traded it back for T6 (was way more fun).

As for exploration value... if you're not in a hurry or not going far into outer rim, then any ship will do. I flew T6, Cobra, Adder, Viper (and plan to do the same with Imp Scout and Orca) and each made a several LY journey very successfully. I honestly don't get Exploration=Asp-or-nothing stance.

Combat? Nah, I tried RES hunting for an hour several months ago, didn't put guns on any ship since, so I can't comment on combat viability.
PvP? Look above.
Trade? It's T6 with a tad more room.

 

[Eros]

I used an ASP to work up to an Imperial Clipper, The 6 hard points work really well. Although limited by Ammo, RES hunting is very good in the ASP though you have to be careful about some of the bigger targets, or getting ambushed. One on One with any targets - smaller and including the imperial clipper are basically easy, no problem. Larger targets are also fine, but requires a little better flying.

Personally 2 class 2 multicannons, 2 class 1 multicannons and 2 burst lasers is a pretty good combo. Burn the shield and melt the hull.

Not the best ship ever for everything, but its definitely a favourite of mine.

 

[Roken]

1 more question ^^
In this previous sentance from someone who replied to my origial post - what does the "res" abbreviation mean...????
((((( RES Farming - an ok choice. Expensive to fit to get performance that's still not quite as good as the vulture. )))))

RES = Resource Extraction Site (located in some planetary rings)

 

[Nemes]

ahhhhh!!!!! res = resource extraction site --- nice one thanks bud ^^

 

[rennarda]

Anything that gets in front of my Asp tends to get chewed up pretty quickly. Quad beams and cannons tend to do that . The trick is getting them infront