Ships Multi-Crew: Turret Suggestions

[AEBRAM]

As the title implies, I am working on this Alliance Crusader for multi-crew Odyssey missions and for general REZ bounty hunting game play. I have not decided on hardpoints since I would like to accommodate multi-crew features. I thought about 3x 1D Rails and 3B APA and use the two Medium hardpoints for multi-crew to give a top/bottom firing arcs.

• How would you distribute the hardpoints?
• What turreted weapon delivers the best return on investment? i.e. so multi-crew buddy doesn't feel their shooting a spit wads at enemies.
• Would you stay away from Rails and PA and lean towards weapons based on TOT? i.e. avoid Rails or PA that do decent damage when firing solutions align.
• Which fighter would you suggest that offers a multi-crew decent contributing damage and survival in case their focused?

The concept here is to have the owner (myself) and two other buddies under multi-crew.

 

[Three Stars]

Alliance C-ships aren’t great for turrets. The only hardpoint with a respectable arc on a Crusader is the top medium, since it covers all angles atop the ship. The lower medium is ok if you’re facing your target but it’s boxed in on 3 sides otherwise. The smalls can fire forward and up but not back or down, same as the large. I’m a little loathe to devote any of the largest hardpoints on a ship to turrets, but that’s just my personal preference.

A long range pulse or burst turret is nice for waking up and getting credit for distant targets, especially if another human being is aiming it. The nature of turrets is to have low damage unfortunately, so I’d rely on the turrets to apply interesting experimentals and to damage things outside your usual firing arcs.

I like having a PA on the large since it’s the most central hardpoint for aiming and I can take power plant shots with it. Otherwise all of the c-ships are good at maintaining time on target, so the weapons are really at your discretion. You’ll be flying the ship and you’ll have the best judgment on when to fire.

All fighters are tissue paper, but the Taipan is at least two ply tissue. The fixed beam one is nice. You can separate the two beams between two triggers in the fire groups so it doesn’t drain the fighter’s WEP in seconds.

The one major change I would have you consider is to swap the shield and the fighter bay sizes (5 <-> 6) so you can have two fighters out at once. You’ll take a hit on shield strength and regen, but two beam fighters flying around is like two additional large hardpoints on your side. That’s worth more than any turrets you could install, and it still covers a team of 3 people.

 

[AEBRAM]

Alliance C-ships aren’t great for turrets. The only hardpoint with a respectable arc on a Crusader is the top medium, since it covers all angles atop the ship. The lower medium is ok if you’re facing your target but it’s boxed in on 3 sides otherwise. The smalls can fire forward and up but not back or down, same as the large. I’m a little loathe to devote any of the largest hardpoints on a ship to turrets, but that’s just my personal preference.

A long range pulse or burst turret is nice for waking up and getting credit for distant targets, especially if another human being is aiming it. The nature of turrets is to have low damage unfortunately, so I’d rely on the turrets to apply interesting experimentals and to damage things outside your usual firing arcs.

I like having a PA on the large since it’s the most central hardpoint for aiming and I can take power plant shots with it. Otherwise all of the c-ships are good at maintaining time on target, so the weapons are really at your discretion. You’ll be flying the ship and you’ll have the best judgment on when to fire.

All fighters are tissue paper, but the Taipan is at least two ply tissue. The fixed beam one is nice. You can separate the two beams between two triggers in the fire groups so it doesn’t drain the fighter’s WEP in seconds.

The one major change I would have you consider is to swap the shield and the fighter bay sizes (5 <-> 6) so you can have two fighters out at once. You’ll take a hit on shield strength and regen, but two beam fighters flying around is like two additional large hardpoints on your side. That’s worth more than any turrets you could install, and it still covers a team of 3 people.

I played around with different turret hardpoints and share the same conclusion. I took your advice and swapped the C6 for C5 shields to slot the C6 SF bay.

This is the final version of the Crusader multi-crew build. As soon as, I have the 3B Advanced Plasma Acc then I'll change the hardpoint.

 

[Three Stars]

Consider this instead.

I prefer armored power plants for safety and better thermals. The cargo hatch and Guardian Frame Shift Booster don’t need to be active when your hardpoints are out, so I made them power priority 5 so they shut off in battle

A biweave costs you a bit of MJ but you’ll have more shields over a longer period of time thanks to the regen. I put in an extra GSRP to make up the difference. I would also consider making the class 4 hull reinforcement heavy duty and putting in a class 1 thermal res one instead. You’re missing module reinforcements, so you’ll have to run away quick if your shields drop.

I’m not sure about the placement of the rails. You have one on top of the ship, one in the middle and one in the bottom. It means you’ll have to be quite far away for all 3 to strike the same module target. From up close you’re likely to miss with at least one of the three.

 

[shevek]

With turrets, overcharged is a good mod.

An overcharged beam turret is not far off the same as an efficient beam gimbal and you get extra pips from the multi crew.

 

[SergMx]

Sorry if this is off-topic, but it's close by.

For a long time I didn't understand why I could climb into a turret and shoot in SRV. I can fly out in a fighter and my ship was controlled by the NPC crew. But I can't switch to a turret on the ship and shoot while my NPC is controlling the ship.
I asked about THIS, I think I even made such a suggestion, but I think this is very difficult to implement and it was not done.

 

[AEBRAM]

Sorry if this is off-topic, but it's close by.

For a long time I didn't understand why I could climb into a turret and shoot in SRV. I can fly out in a fighter and my ship was controlled by the NPC crew. But I can't switch to a turret on the ship and shoot while my NPC is controlling the ship.
I asked about THIS, I think I even made such a suggestion, but I think this is very difficult to implement and it was not done.

That's an interesting scenario since you can switch controls back to the ship when piloting a fighter; I would imagine the implementation would be difficult and I would suspect a ship ownership bug could creep in, where the NPC gains ownership when being assigned to the gunner role. It maybe tied to permissions and roles on how they designed multi-crew.

 

[AEBRAM]

Consider this instead.

I prefer armored power plants for safety and better thermals. The cargo hatch and Guardian Frame Shift Booster don’t need to be active when your hardpoints are out, so I made them power priority 5 so they shut off in battle

A biweave costs you a bit of MJ but you’ll have more shields over a longer period of time thanks to the regen. I put in an extra GSRP to make up the difference. I would also consider making the class 4 hull reinforcement heavy duty and putting in a class 1 thermal res one instead. You’re missing module reinforcements, so you’ll have to run away quick if your shields drop.

I’m not sure about the placement of the rails. You have one on top of the ship, one in the middle and one in the bottom. It means you’ll have to be quite far away for all 3 to strike the same module target. From up close you’re likely to miss with at least one of the three.

I am currently testing the suggestions since I have engineer materials and credits available.

I am set on trying to find the optimal balance for multi-crew and standing on its own. I really like the Crusader on paper, and it has a good profile for ground missions with SF/SRV options. The initial weapons does block one C2 rail when a "joust" pass happens. Not too bad, you have to time the firing more at higher speeds.

The top medium is a choice placement to have a turret hardpoint due to the wide firing arc to track targetted ships. I am testing a C2 Burst-t (focused, no experiment yet) and try the same with a C2 Pulse-t for continued damage.