Ships Advice for Long Range MC Anaconda

Hey Guys,
I'm new to the forum, so first of hi to all commanders o7

I have engineered 7 Long Range gimballed MC's (4 Nuts) and 1 fixed LR pulse Laser for my Corvettaconda (Name because all interals and weapons are going to the Corvette, once I get it^^) When I have all Biotech-Mats, then I can upgrade them fully to max range with 5 nuts. But as I heard, actually G1 LR ist already enough. But anyway, lets get to the point:

I was pretty underwhelmed how it performed yesterday. I took on a Mission, where I had to destroy civilian elite rank ships like Sidewinders, ASPX, Vipers and Cobras. Basicly 90% small ships. But I coulnd't kill one, because they released mines and jumped into Frameshift. I could hardly do any hull damage. It was like one percent per second sort of at a range round about 3km, which LR MC's should actually manage very well. :( I dont know what was wrong yesterday. Maybe because of the mines the projectiles didnt hit the ships? I dont know :( I aborted the mission. Anybody know maybe the reason why i coulndnt do much damage?

Conclusions: Maybe because of the positioning of the small corrosive MC, it couldnt apply corrrosive on the ships. Didnt take notice if it did or not :/

As of today, I went for testing to a High RES, where I pretty much killed up to Master everything pretty fast. Even Anacondas stood no chance. So LR MC's do kind of work. But I noticed, you shouldn't shoot them over 4-5km, because they hardly hit. So today again it felt, as it should feel. I know, it is not like deleting a ship with frag cannons, which I have on my Chieftain, but as I said it felt more accurate today.

Since I learned a bit from this build, I'm thinking of some optimizations.

Here are the Hardpoints: 1 Huge Gimbaled LR Autoloader MC, 1 large Gimbaled LR Autoloader MC, 2 large Gimbaled LR Incendiary MC, 2 Medium Gimbaled LR Autoloader MC, 1 small Gimbaled LR Corrosive MC, 1 small fixed LR emissive pulse Laser.

I'm thinking of due to the positioning as above mentioned of the small corrosive MC, to put corrosive on a medium MC and maybe it could hit targets better?

Since I'm not always fighting an enemy at 2-3 km or more, because they sometimes close in, I am thinking of a heavy hitting weapon at close range beside frag cannon. Any other ideas?

So what do you guys think of this weapon loadout? Any advice on how to optimise it, so I can engage at LR and do some hurting at close range aswell or should I leave it, as it is and maybe you guys know, what was the issue in the misison I had.

Thanks guys

Frenzy
 
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I've found that the only weapons that truly benefit from long range engineering are the hitscan types. (lasers and rails). I've used long range on PA's for the higher projectile speed, but I never fire it at anything over 3km anyway. For multis, I think overcharged (or short range) are the two most optimal engineering options.
 
07 Cmdr and welcome to the forums.

Gimbal jitter missing at LR especially on small ships? I dont have LR MCs so dunno but get closer may be the answer.

I think - best to put OC on bigger MCs and just need one small with Corrosive for the effect. It doesnt always have the effect when it hits I dont think, just a % chance of it happening. Can see the effect happening in their ship image so can see when its happening and when not. For PVE may not need emissive PL, they rarely go 'cold' or not often enough to be an issue for me anyway, try Phasing maybe for hull damage instead?

Elite rank ships will usually have engineering to make them stronger and can be tanky, try a weaker one at Nav Bacon and see what happens, whether hitting or missing at distance etc and try at closer range say up to 1km. Sub target modules (PP usually or FSD first if they keep getting away) Will be more noticeable what the issue is on weaker ships anyway, if Harmless and taking little / no damage at LR you ain't hitting it regularly full stop due to jitter.
 
Unfortunately the problem you are experiencing is the result of inherent wander the gimballs have. You may notice that at 4km you able to kill large ships relative well but cant hit small ones at all. The same problem happens on gimballed LR lasers too. LR mods are great on fixed weapons because the effect isnt counteracted by the gimball wandering. As for your Anaconda, i will let you figure it out but I will tell you that the small hardpoints are great for railguns.
 
Long range MCs are not very effective. As noted, the micro jitter will mean your bullets will go all around small ships without hitting.

Better to go with short range on MCs, to G3 or 4 so you still have some range. Overcharged is good too.

Corrosive works very well on huge MCs too as they are quite ammo efficient and will shred targets.

If you want some range, put 2 large beams with G2-3 long range and thermal vent. You'll take down shields much quicker with more thermal weapons.

The small hardpoints on the Conda are awkwardly placed. Almost useless unless your target is dead ahead and slightly below.

Grade 5 (5 nuts) long range engineering is mostly a waste of materials (with some exceptions)

With those massacre missions, you need to get the shields down quick. Either take their hull out quickly or target and destroy their FSD module so they can't jump out. An engineered Conda should be able to shred those civilians in no time.
 
Multi-Cannons and Fragment Cannons with their falloff starting at 1.8km benefit little from Long Range damage-wise, it is even worse for Plasma Accelerators with 2km and for cannons there is no damage increase at all up to 4.5km. This is for fixed mounts, add in the drunk wobble of gimbals, as already noted in several posts.

Most laser's falloff start already at 600m, and rail gun's at 1km, making Long Range a viable choice on those weapon types, even though hitscan weapons do not benefit from doubled projectile speed. On these G1 Long range is a lot of bang for the buck.
 
Sometimes, NPC has different engineered mods, so it can happen to see different time to kill on two different NPC but same ship model. Higher is the rank, higher are the engineering.

As said by badibeat, LR is more viable for laser and rail gun. Because they benefits from extending the "fall off" damage distance. With MC, your fall off damage is already high (near 2km) so putting LR on that module will not increase your DPS that much. On laser, going from 800 m to 2KM ... yeah, that's a good choice :). G1 is a good spot and relatively cheap in term of materials.

All in all, you should try Overcharged or Short range with MC. Those modification will increase your damage directly. At G3, I think this is 50%. I don't have much experience with Short range, so I would go for Overcharged. But both are good I think. I also see people advising to use Rapid Fire on MC. You don't increase the damage of each of your bullet but because you shooting faster (75%) the target is going down faster also lol. With rapid fire, you can also use experimental like High capa. But i never tested it myself. In paper, seems good option also.
 
Hey Guys,

huge thank you to all the your advices, builds and clearifying things. I really appreciate it ^^

What I'm first going to do is, switch the huge and one large MC from LR to OC or Rapid fire. Then I'm thinking of putting corrosive on one medium hardpoint at the front, because I am not hitting the small ships sometimes due to the positioning of the small hardpoints. Besides that I will make the Medium MC High Capacity with corrosive then. At the moment, Im enjoying the fact, that I dont need all pips in weapons, because of having mostly MC's. So I will try that first out, if it works for me. If Im still not satisfied, then I will switch the 2 top large hardpoints into Beam lasers.

What I have also noticed is, that when you dont have any pips in weapons and the Wep capacitor ins fully drained, then the ship overheats (The heat indicator left side next to the radar). Is that true?

Thanks again guys.

All the best and fly safe Cmdrs o7
 
What I have also noticed is, that when you dont have any pips in weapons and the Wep capacitor ins fully drained, then the ship overheats (The heat indicator left side next to the radar). Is that true?
Yes, pips to WEP / WEP capacitor actually IS weapon cooling. Weapons don't fire if there is not enough charge left in the WEP capacitor, and produce less heat if the WEP capacitor is full.
 
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A few things that help me kill those chicken civilians:
  • targeting FSD
  • lots of burst damage (Plasma Acc, or Frags if you prefer)
  • ramming (with 4 pips to sys) before opening fire.
  • possibly the Scramble Spectrum experimental.
Also note that you can kill any civilians of the proper faction for credit. And those you find at e.g. the Nav Beacon will likely be lower ranked and less runny compared to the ones in the mission area.
 
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