Combat people, what do I do with a Vulture?

iBR0WNY

I
I haven't used a Vulture since before engineering was a thing and I think remember it having major power management issues. Obviously now I can overcharge the PP but does that make it over heat? Should I go for clean or dirty drives? I used to use 2 pulse lasers but I don't know if that's the best option and I definitely don't know the best upgrades for weapons. Any tips would be appreciated. Treat me like a total noon because I am when it comes to combat.

I want to build at least one good combat ship because I'm going back to Colonia and shipping a few ships out there to stay, so I don't keep getting caught in the engineers grind.
 

Redomus

R
dave_92 said:
I haven't used a Vulture since before engineering was a thing and I think remember it having major power management issues. Obviously now I can overcharge the PP but does that make it over heat? Should I go for clean or dirty drives? I used to use 2 pulse lasers but I don't know if that's the best option and I definitely don't know the best upgrades for weapons. Any tips would be appreciated. Treat me like a total noon because I am when it comes to combat.

I want to build at least one good combat ship because I'm going back to Colonia and shipping a few ships out there to stay, so I don't keep getting caught in the engineers grind.
Click to expand...

Dirty drag drives, I prefer an armoured powerplant personally (comes with a small power boost now and can be monstered for an extra 5% iirc) along with a tasty bi-weave shield. Weapons wise, if you can get them and use them a particle accellerator is nice, with either target lock break or phasing depending on what you like to do.

Second weapon, pulse works fine, as does an overcharged multi-cannon or a second PA, or frags.

This one is on my to do list once I have finished re-tinkering some other ships.
 

viper1209

viper1209
I build one some weeks ago. It has been meaned for trying Combat Zones but I found out it's a real fun to fight with.

Hardpoints:
3C gimbaled Multicannon G5 sturdy (for armor piercing)
3C gimbaled Beam Laser G5 efficient OR 3C Plasma Accelerator G5 efficient

Core:
Military grade armor
4A Power Plant
5A Thrusters G4 Dirty
4A Frame shift
5A Power Distributor
4D Sensors

Optional:
5C Bi-Wave
5D Hull reinforcement G5 Thermal resistant
4D Hull reinforcement G5 Thermal resistant
2A Auto Field-Maintanance Unit
2x 1D Module reinforcement

Utilities:
Chaff
Point Defence
Heat Sink
0C Shield booster

Nearly every PVE 1vs1 fight is easy with 2pips SYS and 4pips WEP and only Cargo scoop and AFMU get deactivated on deploying hardpoints. Even nearly killed a Corvette in a CZ with this loadout but then his buddys came to safe him and I had to run :D

EDIT: added Utilities
 
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Ddraig

Ddraig
I am using a Vulture almost exclusively. Did the last CG in it and it was a blast.

I upped my PP to Overcharged G4 with the thermal experimental to help with cooling, so I was able to equip 2 large plasmas with G5 efficient mod and slugs as experimental effect. This meant I needed some extra fuel tank to shot the plasmas for a longer time. I think the total shots is like 200 or something among those lines.
This also allowed me to use 3 Shield boosters and Bi-waves shield I upped the resistances to over 50% in all areas while keeping around 450 Mj of shield strength. Crazy thing is, I still have room for more upgrades on the shields area because the Thermal shields are only G4.
The usual PD with recharge enhanced G5. No power issues to keep a FSD G5 with Mass Manager which leaves my ship jumping some 23 Light years. Upped my engines to max G5 Dirty Drives and Drag Drives which gives it a boost speed of 550 m/s and in combat I keep a 3 0 3 pip distribution for turreted enemies or fighting more than one opponent, 4 0 2 when I want my shields to last and 0 3 3 against small ships, because aiming the plasmas towards small agile ships is a pain, fun but pain.

Now, with this setup I though the shields while hefty, would drop easily, so I added armor and reinforcements. But in the last CG not once my shields dropped, I was careful not never bite more than I could chew. SO whenever I got in the middle of a large group and they all aggroed me, I went 2 4 0 and boosted away leaving them all in the dust, none of my boosters is a heavy duty one, so the shields recharged rather fast and back to the action, picked my targets one by one or lured the ones I wanted to kill outside the action area. So, I dropped the reinforcements, installed a class 4 scoop, an SRV and 2 small fuel tanks and been doing scan missions, courier missions, getting materials from USS locations.

Overall, the engineers break the game and the Vulture simply has no more power issues whatsoever.
 

Ashnak

Ashnak
I don't like asymmetric loadouts, and I'm not that sure about the details, but mine looks something like this:

black friday paintjob <- sorry, but that is important

either
fixed dual efficient beams with thermal vent <- no limit to endurance
or
fixed dual double shot pacifiers with screening shell <- kills things fast, sometimes too fast (like, you get interdicted by a pirate. They try to scan you and you blast them out of the sky before your FSD has cooled down) up to and including NPC 'vettes in assasination missions

dirty drives, of course
bi-weave shields, efficient mod with fast charge
reflective armour with low weight
hull reinforcement in the military slot, module reinforcements in everything that's not used for something else. Or vice versa. Not really critical, since if you let the shield go down, you're in trouble anyway. The Vulture is fast and agile enough so that you can avoid enemy fire unless you want to trade some hits on the shields in exchage for a short and frank exchage of views. Like a couple of PAs on the nose against 16 rounds of ripple fire pacifier goodness (grade 5 double shot, 8 rounds in the clip, both barrels, point blank).

I usually use the size 4 slot for mission specifics, swap between fuel scoop, cargo, whatever
a 2A FSD interdictor for some missions, swap out with a SRV if necessary
oh, and A-rated life support. Sometimes, they will get your shields down. If this happens, the canopy is as good as gone. The 25 minute backup ensures that you can stay around long enough to first recharge your shields and then come back and teach them about manners.
the scoop in the size 4 slot usually goes with the pair of scanners (ADS & DSS) in the size 1 slots

range upgraded FSD

All that will run from a grade 2 overcharged PP with the thermal spread effect.
 

khaos526

khaos526
Ashnak said:
fixed dual double shot pacifiers with screening shell <- kills things fast, sometimes too fast (like, you get interdicted by a pirate. They try to scan you and you blast them out of the sky before your FSD has cooled down) up to and including NPC 'vettes in assasination missions
Click to expand...
You know, maybe there is hope for my Vulture that's been gutted out and left in limbo for years. I need to try this weapon config out...
 

iBR0WNY

I
Thanks for all the replies. I just realized I don't even have the right engineers unlocked yet so this is going to take a loooong time. Must mean I've never nodded weapons before.

I think I'm going to go for either 2 OC multi cannons or 2 double shot frag cannons. Am I right thinking that thermal shields and hull are better for pve?
 

the100thmonkey

the100thmonkey
At the moment, I'm running two G3 long range PACs with target lock breaker and phasing sequence.

Heat is an issue if you're flying FA-on. FA-off makes it much more manageable (you'll still take some module damage though) because the engines are only firing about 20% of the time. I had G5 long range on it previously, but they tend to really cook you. I'm going to put them on to my Chieftain, when I get round to buying one, or on my Anaconda.
 

Achilles7

Banned
Achilles7
Since abandoning the impunity of my increasingly boring Unfair-De-Lance...this is the build for my new go-to ship, PvE & PvP:

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Most serious PvPers have apex FDLs that do 560+m/s, ergo it is essential that your ship does at least this for when they run &...when you run! [big grin] This build also requires good pip management in CZs & especially in PvP; & if you are good at multitasking under pressure an AFMU is a good option in your C2 slot to deal with the Vulture's infamously fragile canopy.

Weaponry? Depending on my target type my hard-points are equipped with fixed o/c'd multis with oversized (I'm going to change to autoloader when I get the time!) / efficient APAs with TLB / or double-shot pacifiers with screening shell & of course, for farming the NPC idiots in CZs & HazRESs, fixed efficient pulses with phasing are a good 'no-ammo-needed' option.

Oh & swap the heat-sink for a pdt or double chaff or another resist-aug booster or KWS or...whatever!

EDIT: Mistakenly included two C1 HRPs instead of 1D MRPs.
 
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Lanceor

Lanceor
Two Efficient Plasma Accelerators (Advanced Plasma Accelerators if you have them). A beautifully handling ship and a weapon that takes some skill to use, but is so incredibly satisfying when it hits. :)

Add the Dispersal Field and Target Lock Breaker experimentals to the plasmas and big ships will be unable to hit you!
 

Stealthie

Stealthie
The new engineering upgrades for PPs are very useful.

You can (if you want to) add a G5 overcharged upgrade to an A-rated PP and then apply the "cooling" (I forget what it's actually called) special effect and the result will be a PP that still only has a thermal load of 0.5 (IIRC).

I Just finished re-engineering my Vulture.
I'ts got DD5s, a long-range MC and a long-range beam-laser, 5C bi-weaves, 2 x boosters and an SCB.
It used to need a G5 overcharged PP to power the ship.

Now it can make do with a G4 overcharged PP which, with the "cooling" SFX, gives it a thermal factor of 0.48 (down from 0.65) and gives me a couple of megawatts of extra juice.

If I wanted to, I probably could have got away with using a G3 overcharged mod' instead but that yields a thermal factor of 0.45 so I figured that going for the G4 wouldn't make a lot of difference and it'd give me some extra power in case I need it in the future.

TL;DR: The new PP mod's, and the cooling SFX, allow you to make great improvements to how ships operate compared to what you could do under the old system.
 
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