60 LY resistant exploration builds

[Jcarmona]

I came across a Reddit thread titled So You Want to Explore DW in Open, but You Don’t Want to Risk Dying? It addressed the fact that it is possible to build an exploration ship that offers the following:

1. Ability to boost
2. 60 LY minimum jump range laden
3. Good shields
4. Ability to resist hostile encounters (NPC and human)
5. Ability to do all this while carrying the usual exploration goodies (AFMU, SRV, heat sinks, detailed surface scanner).

Unfortunately, the links to the builds are no longer working.

No problem.

I post here the builds I use, in addition to others I have derived from them. All of them require having unlocked the guardian FSD booster and the “core” engineers to fully achieve the specifications mentioned above.

1. DBX

Here is a fully engineered one that has 704 MJ shields, can almost permaboost to almost 500 m/s, and carry the essential exploration gear:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

No time to unlock all the core engineers and the big expedition is just weeks away?

Worry no more.

With just Auntie Felicity and Elvira unlocked and maxed out, and the guardian booster unlocked, you can get yourself a DBX with better shields than the stock one.The build below still has a nice boost, vastly improved shields over the stock ones, carries your essential exploration gear and still has that 60 LY laden jump range, and uses just Elvira and Auntie Felicity:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

2. The AspX

This one needs full engineering to really achieve the specs mentioned at the beginning of this article and gives you the least shields of the ships shown here. Still, they are a vast improvement over the stock ones:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

If you have the time and are willing to be at the service of Princess Duval for a couple of weeks, here is a build for you: stronger shields while still having that 60 LY plus jump range:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

3. Krait Phantom (KP)

The KP is also another favorite for exploration, having the ability to carry our favorite exploration toys except the SLF (that is for the Annie). Here is a build that is faster than a FDL in boost, can permaboost (as in forever, without any letup), and has great maneuverability.

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

4. Anaconda

The Annie offers many possibilities and possible combinations to get a well protected ship while having at least 70 LY laden jump ranges. Here are some:

a. The “everything including the kitchen sink”:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

The a is from poster uBrainProtest from the Iridium Wing.

b. My build, which is currently in use:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

c. the build I just created today using Coriolis:

https://s.orbis.zone/5027

which I will also use in my next trip. It carries the full gear (repair limpets, SLF, 2 SRVs, 2 AFMUs).

Note that in all the builds except the Iridium one, a docking computer is used. I really like them and always use them in all my ships.

Why these builds?

If you elect to play in open, gankers and griefers are a real possibility, especially when returning from the trip and even in distant areas. They are not going to go away so the best protection is to have a ship that can resist these attacks while doing the usual stuff in preparation to high waking to another system (there are plenty of videos that show how to flee a gank).

Of course, you can avoid this by playing solo (I play in solo). However, even if playing solo, the possibility of encountering a high ranked NPC that can easily destroy a lightly shielded exploration vessel exists when reentering inhabited space. These builds can buy time while preparing to flee.
Note that all of them rely on shielding and the ability to boost quickly to flee a hostile situation-hence the dirty thrusters with drag drives.

It can be extremely frustrating to lose weeks or months of dedicated exploration efforts and hundreds of millions of credits of data to an attacker flying a fully engineered combat ship, who can easily destroy the lightly shielded, lightly armored exploration ship in seconds.

Is it possible to explore in an unengineered ship? Absolutely. I earned exploration Elite in this build:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

Happy exploring!

 

[Hooplah]

Take your preferred explorer ship, go out 5000LY and back, then dial it in. Me I used an Orca going to Colonia using the
Newtron highway. A sidewinder could pull this off. The point is to take the ship you like then go do it. A player can read
all about the best exploration designs, watch a lot of YouTube videos etc. But until you do it then you are following some
other player's suggestion as to how to do it. How they fly may not come close to how you fly. Make it your own personal
experience. Then enjoy the game.

 

[C64Fan]

Take your preferred explorer ship, go out 5000LY and back, then dial it in. Me I used an Orca going to Colonia using the
Newtron highway. A sidewinder could pull this off. The point is to take the ship you like then go do it. A player can read
all about the best exploration designs, watch a lot of YouTube videos etc. But until you do it then you are following some
other player's suggestion as to how to do it. How they fly may not come close to how you fly. Make it your own personal
experience. Then enjoy the game.

So true and well said.

 

[space voyager]

Take your preferred explorer ship, go out 5000LY and back, then dial it in. Me I used an Orca going to Colonia using the
Newtron highway. A sidewinder could pull this off. The point is to take the ship you like then go do it. A player can read
all about the best exploration designs, watch a lot of YouTube videos etc. But until you do it then you are following some
other player's suggestion as to how to do it. How they fly may not come close to how you fly. Make it your own personal
experience. Then enjoy the game.

All true, yet the OP went to great lengths to present builds, optimized to the selected task; a relatively long range explorers that do have a moderate protection. Well done, OP.

IMO it is worth noting that to achieve this relative safety you really want to
-Boost towards the attacker (not into one) and randomly change direction when going past him
-Use a heat sink to disappear from the radar
-Have a chaff launcher, too, both for celebratory reasons on far away worlds and most importantly, to prevent tracked weapons from hitting you when running away. The mass and energy consumption are not worth mentioning, its effects ARE.

And there are other small but advisable details if you really want to survive in open. Though, judging from Distant Worlds 2 expedition, I strongly advice private groups. I did some ganker testing at Sag-A (after we got the station) and there were quite a lot of them. After several successive ganks I did get destroyed, so when the real thing (departure) came, I chose safety.

 

[Friedenreich Xante]

I explore in Open. I come back home in Solo. That's still only 0,000something percent time I spend in Solo. Problem solved, no need to carry extra protection gear. There's no amount of shield that can protect you against some meta PvP builds, and when you've spent months in the black you mostly lost your self-defense reflexes. I would most probably panic and boost into the assaillant or do something else silly, and therefore sacrified 0,5 or even up to 1 ly jump range for nothing.

But thanks anyway for those builds. They may still come in handy for rat ships, when tweaked a little.

 

[Dr. Nagi]

I explore in Open. I come back home in Solo. That's still only 0,000something percent time I spend in Solo. Problem solved, no need to carry extra protection gear. There's no amount of shield that can protect you against some meta PvP builds, and when you've spent months in the black you mostly lost your self-defense reflexes. I would most probably panic and boost into the assaillant or do something else silly, and therefore sacrified 0,5 or even up to 1 ly jump range for nothing.

But thanks anyway for those builds. They may still come in handy for rat ships, when tweaked a little.

Yes, that.
Just an example, my escort build for CCC4 has an estimated DPS (damage per second) of 1700. Most of the builds linked in the OP are one-shot with that, and also fixed weapons so chaff doesn't even help against that. So it comes down to pure luck and personally wouldn't risk hundreds of millions in exploration data (+ the tags) for a chance.

 

[space voyager]

I explore in Open. I come back home in Solo. That's still only 0,000something percent time I spend in Solo. Problem solved, no need to carry extra protection gear. There's no amount of shield that can protect you against some meta PvP builds, and when you've spent months in the black you mostly lost your self-defense reflexes. I would most probably panic and boost into the assaillant or do something else silly, and therefore sacrified 0,5 or even up to 1 ly jump range for nothing.

But thanks anyway for those builds. They may still come in handy for rat ships, when tweaked a little.

Ehm, technically true, but speaking of modes in exploration is redundant. Any time you're 1kLYs out of the bubble (and not at a well known site) you're in solo. And when this proves wrong, you're likely to regret it.

If my ship did not have an above average shield for an exploration at SagA a few months back, I'd lose a lot of exploration data... For a lonely ganker was looking for some company and fun. Especially the latter.

So, IMO, you're playing 100% in solo and there's a lot of us just like you - and this is where the FD's statistics fails; it will never tell the true % of solo vs open. They tell us how many play in open while most explorers log into open because it is the first icon to log into and because we hope to meet a nice soul out there.

 

[Friedenreich Xante]

Ehm, technically true, but speaking of modes in exploration is redundant. Any time you're 1kLYs out of the bubble (and not at a well known site) you're in solo. And when this proves wrong, you're likely to regret it.

Ever heard of expeditions and meetups?

 

[space voyager]

Ever heard of expeditions and meetups?

I completed Distant Worlds 2, so yeah, I have heard of expeditions. I also know that there was a parallel expedition going on, called Distant Ganks. Members of that expedition did A LOT of jumping just to destroy explorers at the next meetup. Which is also why practically all of us played in private groups - and the rest mostly travelled back to the bubble in an instant. Only once I checked the open mode at any of the waypoints (EDIT: It was at Beagle Point) - in an SRV. As I had two and was curious if open is really as populate as they say.

It was. I lost that SRV though I could combat log - and it would be a good deed, too, to *** the ganker.

EDIT 2: Thinking about it, the members of Distant Ganks expedition travelled in open all the time, so that data on open is solid.

 

[Burke]

Not like i play any more but an alternative anaconda explorer. Its obviously not designed to fight anybody but as space voyager said, there is nobody out there. Its not my exact old build but its a good template to be tweaked by the individual explorer. There are two empty slots aswell, one had the old scanner and one is the new slot given.

Anaconda

 

[Ravenov]

Minor tweak to that Asp: 5D thrusters is better than 4A, plus with some power management you can drop to engineered 4A power plant (armoured G2 with stripped down should be sufficient i think).