If ever there was a ship that NEEDED G5 dirty drives, its the cutter, which the OP states they recently acquired.
2 part answer...So looking at Qwent (G3 thrusters) and then the Professor (G5), I am wondering if it's worth it to unlock the G5 thrusters? I have 25 modular terminals but getting the prof to unlock and deliver G5's seems a lot of effort for G3 to G5's? Then there are those "sensor fragments", which I have no idea about?
Perhaps I am getting a bit grind weary, I have just purchased my Cutter! Anyone vouch for G5 Vs G3's?
Boost speed?Of course they are better, just look at the numbers.
The question should be are G3 A's better than G5 D's? And how much better are G5A's than G5D's?
I sue G5 D rated thrusters in my trade Cutter to maximise jump range and they're mighty close in performance to the G5 A's.
Boost speed?
I think u lose 60m/s on every ship using the D's
Yes I go along with you here. I have a Courier, Aspx, type 10 and my new Cutter! Now they are all A rated thrusters on G3. The Aspx is the fastest monouverer, but since it's for exploration and unarmed that's moot. The Courier feels more like a bigger ship and would probably benefit from G5. The type 10 was, well, a type 10. More like a B17 Flying Fortress, a "let the turrets do the job" ship. The Cutter feels similar to the Courier in a turning scrap against AI pirates? Why this should be I have no idea, but that's my subjective opinion.At the risk of stating the obvious, I think it depends on the ship.
If you're flying a T9/T10 it's probably not going to make that much difference if you make the extra effort to apply a G5 mod to the thrusters.
Conversely, if you're flying an iCourier or Viper, G5 thrusters are probably going to be a key part of your build.
Same thing applies to more "normal" ships, less obviously.
If you're flying, say, a Krait or Python as a multirole then you're probably going to be fine with G3 thruster mod's.
Sure, it's nice to apply a G5 mod' when you can but you're not going to feel like your ship's "half-finished" just because it only has G3 modded thrusters.
Really, at this point in time I am thinking it's not worth the faff just to go G5 thrusters on the Cutter. The Cutter can hold its own with the weapons I've engineered, using boost/turn/shoot. But who knows, that 5000 ly 'iron man" test is tempting me!
Wish the cutters brakes could be G5'd
Cutters neither have lateral or ventral or dorsal thrusters.Cutters aint got no brakes, thats rumors..
There's a reason mine's called the "Objects In Mirror"Cutters aint got no brakes, thats rumors..
You will need to be very fast to make that happenThere's a reason mine's called the "Objects In Mirror"
Flying something that uses a small pad, you wanna make extra certain you can't see her looming up over you as you enter the slot.
I've had her suddenly slow down in the slot for a couple of seconds before my shields took a massive hit as an NPC ship went up in smoke, from getting wedged between me and the walls.You will need to be very fast to make that happen
Cutters aint got no brakes, thats rumors..
I suggested this years ago, but as we all know, the game is doomed (with a different in-print OC.)FDev should do "bumper sticker" decals.
They could do one for the Cutter that says "I brake for Gas Giants" or something.
Thanks for the reply. My "new" (toy) Cutter is here:On my main account I tend to obsess over "finishing" every ship, which means G5ing everything.
On my alt-account, I just engineer ships as I find mat's.
Overall, I tend to find that most mat's up to G4 just "appear" in my inventory after a bit of scavving and a bit of shooting.
Most of my every-day ships (on my alt-account) are G3/G4 engineered and, frankly, I don't really miss the extra engineering.
Once in a while I'll be flying a ship and, for example, think "Hey, these lasers are running out of juice quicker than I recall" and then I'll realise that the PDist is only G3 engineered or than the lasers are only G3 efficient but it isn't really a big deal.
Regarding the Cutter, specifically, as has already been said, the main thing is to decide what thrusters to fit before engineering them.
The Cutter works okay with 7A thrusters, 8D thrusters and 8A thrusters.
For ultimate speed you're going to want 8A thrusters and you're going to want to apply a G5 Dirty Drive mod but they're expensive and they'll require a bigger PP and PDist.
If your Cutter is just a mining ship or a cargo ship you'll probably be fine fitting either 7A thrusters or 8D thrusters (IIRC, 8Ds work a bit better than 7As) instead.
It kind of sucks to go to all the trouble of G5 engineering a set of 8A thrusters and then realising you don't really need 'em.
Here's my Cutter build on Coriolis: https://s.orbis.zone/461-
Try having a play around with that, swapping the thrusters for 7As and 8As, to get an idea of how much difference it makes.
Pay attention to stuff like what PP and PDist will be required to power them.
For me, 8D thrusters were fine, and allowed me to fit a smaller PP and PDist which, in turn, gave me a couple of extra Ly jump-range too.
Indeed, Qwent is only for finding Palin. Qwent is useless for anything else, at least speaking for myself, I already had G5 power plant and distributor. There was no other way to get introduced to Palin!Am I the only one who is looking at this thread and thinking "But Qwent doesn't engineer thrusters. He only does power plants and power distributors."
Shouldn't you be going to Farseer for G3 thruster mods?
Of course if you do decide to go G5 you'll still need access to Qwent in order to discover where Palin's base is. Plus you'll not only need the 25 fragments but also have to have travelled at least 5000Ly from your initial game starting point.
It was the 5000Ly that almost drove me insane.