Ships Alliance Chieftain - Shield Tank?

Terris Clavain

T
Hi Folks,

I'm a recent convert to the Cheiftain (from a Krait Mk 2). Initially I was hull tanking, which was working ok, but was a bit underwhelming, especially as I don't have access to all the engineers required to mod the hull reinforcements etc. As an experiment I've switched to a shield tank using the Guardian shield reinforcement mods and it seems to have dramatically improved survivability (and my enjoyment!) As a relative newbie to combat I'm only currently running up to expert level BH missions (with the odd Elite thrown in!).

Are there any seasoned vets out there with a view on hull vs shield tanking on the Chieftain for the higher level combat missions?

Any views greatly appreciated :)

Regards,

TC
 

Ceekay

Ceekay
There are various schools of thought on ship shielding my take is bi-weave (thermal + fast charge), a combination of boosters to get balanced resistances with a bias towards thermal and Guardian shield packages to get the required level.

However with a fast charge/regen resistance build approach you can have too big a shield i.e the total shield strength can be so high that regen times are excessive so as a rule of thumb (and some testing) I usually go with around 650 - 850 MJ using a class 6C bi-weave (around 900 - 1200 on a class 7).

I reckon once you get beyond these levels the reinforced + hicap, heavy duty boosters and SCB's is a more suitable approach, also bear in mind the PD has an impact on shield performance e.g. 4 pips to shields more than doubles the strength. Fast charge does put a heavy drain on the PD so keep an eye on it during combat as it can be drained trying to regen the shield.

Here's a possible Chieftain build

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous
s.orbis.zone s.orbis.zone

Also check out the Challenger

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous
s.orbis.zone s.orbis.zone
 

Krieger

Krieger
I see the Chieftain as a hybrid shield/hull tanker. My Chief is a bit of an eccentric build with all fixed Shortrange cannons and a single Feedback Cascade rail gun to counter shield cells. The trick is: cannon distributor draw is so low it can fight with just 1/2 pip to WPN. I set 2 pips to SYS and 3 1/2 pips to ENG and with that it is so manoeuvrable it hardly gets hit at all. The double chaff is to counter the target's gimballed/turreted weapons while target shields are up, after target shields are down the Dispersal Field special on one of the cannons takes care of them.

It's very effective in Elite assassination missions against medium and large ships (Fer de Lance, Anaconda Corvette). For short missions like assassinations the low ammo count on cannons is no problem. It might be a limitation in CZs but I've never used it there. In RES sites taking on small manoeuvrable ships (Eagle, Viper, Diamond Back) is tedious with all fixed weapons. But I do destroy them... albeit after some nasty curses ;).

Tonight I was planning on testing CZs in the Beta. I'll take the Chief there to see how it goes.
 
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Krieger

Krieger
Update on The Chief's adventures in CZs.

As I expected ammo is marginal on this build. In low and medium intensity CZ ammo was just about enough to make it to victory, in high intensity CZ I ran out of ammo just before victory. Shields held better than expected I lost them a few times but hull tanking went fine, lowest I got was 68% hull (after hit with corrosive), still 60% module reinforcements left, no module malfunctions. Thanks to speed and manoeuvrability I escaped a few times from getting swarmed by enemies. A Corvette with prismatic shields took 1/3rd of my ammo to destroy. I had 3-4 Chaff per launcher left after each battle.
 

Terris Clavain

T
Thank you for the responses guys, much appreciated!

In terms of weapons I’ve been running with 3 x small pulse (overcharged to lvl 3at the mo) 1 x medium multi (overcharged lvl 3) 2 x large multi (both overcharged, 1 x corrosive and 1 x oversized). I’ve been flying some wing missions with a couple of friends, and I’ve been on fighter control whilst they take on the Anacondas. Seems to be working quite well...all weapons gimballed at this point. I tried some rails but with the amount of times I missed my DPS took a massive knock. Perhaps with some more practice!

having an absolute blast with Chieftain though...it’s so much fun to fly. Once you get used to the flight profile, you can get away with some interesting dogfighting moves (albeit a tad unorthodox;-))
 

Gamsir

G
OP has probably moved on but here’s something for inspiration.

I’ve spent some timegetting my Chieftain ‘right’.
I really don’t like hull tanks - the idea seems obsolete when shield tech is available. But some of my favorite ships are typically viewed as hull tanks.

I find that for my playstyle I generally need above 700 mj of balanced shields in a small vulture to fight comfortably. I generally do HAZRES and take on two ship wings alone, but expect to loose the shield sometimes.

in general I agree with Ceekays advice above. Going from one fight to another, you need bi weave shields, and in assasinations missions the Chief is so manouverable with high dps that you don’t need much more.

My Chieftain does take more hits (I guess) due to its size and in my experience, the modules seem vulnerable.
Most Chieftain builds I’ve noticed have high hulls which doesn’t apeal to me, so I’ve tweaked my build many times.

Gamsir Cheiftain

I opted to increase the shields to about 909 raw mj (2000+ with resistances). With a guardian module reinforcement my hull still gets just about the same stats as the shields.
This build really does what it’s supposed to. The shield will only break due to pilot overconfidence or error. When that happens, the hull is more than sufficient to get away from trouble. It also takes the edge of those pesky railgun ships.

While my build is not a clean shield tank per say, the build has enough to function as such (for me)
 

Kayvan

Kayvan
I'm gonna raise this thread since I am about to get me a Chieftain. I like fast and agile ships with good firepower, so this seems to be right up my alley. However, since I only started the game about a week ago, I don't have access to a lot of Engineering yet. So here I'm asking you for advice how to outfit a PvE Chieftain with no engineering, no Guardian stuff, nothing you unlock only later.

Oh and this is mostly for RES combat for the time being, pirate hunting and such. Currently I'm flying a Vulture for that, but my Wing buddies all zoom around in their Ferdies and Vettes and I feel a bit outgunned in my little fighter.

It sure has a lot of internals. Instinctively, I'd use Bi-Weaves and split the Mil compartments between Hull, Mod and SCB. But then I heard/read that you wouldn't use SCBs on a Chief, though I don't know why.

As for firepower, I'm prolly not skilled enough yet to keep fixed guns trained on targets, so I guess it's a question of sticking to gimballed or practicing more to git gud. ;) What are the best weapons to practice fixed mounts with? Beam laser? Burst?
 

Gamsir

G
Kayvan: if you enjoy the vulture, you’re sure to enjoy the Chief. Se my entry above.
Scb’s on a Chief is redundant. Use the manouverability to avoid damage and if the shield do break, the hulls will save your hide. Module space is better saved for better defences.

lasers do seem the best option for ‘training’ fixed weapons because of hitscan. Efficient beams do same damage as overcharged pulses but with less energydrain. In the start, overcharged beams could be a good choice because of rather extreme high dps.
I always use gimballed weapons and plasma cannons (seembuild above).

getting into engineering is rather fast and easy. Follow the guides and go to the Maia system and buy the apropiate rare commodity and sell it at farseer. That’t unlock some good basic modification options. Takes mayby an hour or two depending on your current ship.

have fun
 

Kayvan

Kayvan
That looks great, though ofc that is some pretty advanced equipment. ^^ I hope it also works with more basic components. So, I did manage to get the first couple of ENG mods installed and got me a Chieftain. So far I just sought me some RES action and the ship is just lovely. It drifts quite a bit in the turns but I like that. ^^ Just need to adjust to it when fighting in asteroid fields. xD
 

Gamsir

G
Drifting gets much better with dirty drives engineering.
Originally I dropped the chieftain because of it, but when I went back and dirty drived it, the manouvering is pretty tight
 

Kayvan

Kayvan
For now, I have outfitted my Chief as follows: everything with best available rating, Bi-Weaves, 4x Shield Boosters, 2 Large MCs, rest Beam Lasers. 1 Shield Cell, 1 Module and 2 Hull reinforcement.
Engineering: FSD 1 (long range), Clean Drives 1 (because I just couldn't find the Dirty Drives component anywhere), long range scanners, overcharged MC, Shields with Thermal enhancement.

So far I'm super happy with the ship, it feels great to fight in it. Okay, I do notice the shields aren't super-strong, but the thermal upgrade already helped. Another issue is that the Beam Lasers produce too much heat -- I get heat warnings before the energy runs out, so I might tune those back to Burst Lasers.
Investigating laser upgrades, I had to understand that most burst/beam laser engineers are hard or impossible to unlock for a law-abiding citizen. Several of them want you to smuggle stuff, and I have no idea how to do that without getting caught. :( Or they require you to have a high Combat rank, from which I'm still light-years away (currently Novice).
Not counting the guy in Colonia. Dude, I'm not gonna travel 40kly just to get some laser upgrades. :eek:
 

Northpin

Northpin
This is my Chief shield tank
Granted, plasma slugs is not helping with such small fuel tank but it is funny while it lasts
Anyway, i will revert to classic experimentals or completely change weaponry
 

Kayvan

Kayvan
Yeah, as I said, it's gonna be a long long loooooooong time before I ever get the chance to unlock an engineer that does lasers.
 

WeComeInPeace

WeComeInPeace
Interesting builds. (y) And yes the Chieftain is a fun ship to fly.

One comment: When engineering an agile ship like the Chieftain or the Vulture, try and focus on the agility. It's kind of the point about those kind of ships, that they are "easy" to maneuver out of enemy fire and get yourself in a good firing position. The heavier your ship gets, the less agile. Especially with dirty drags a ship that is too heavy can quickly lose a lot of speed and pitch. For that look at the "minimum mass" under thrusters and your total mass. Another good tool is the "Profiles" tab at Coriolis. There you find a graph called engine profile:

1579129707315.png


You want to keep the vertical dotted line (the mass) to the left of where the curve start dropping if possible.

I used to keep my ships very sturdy, but the more I learn to fly them, the more I move towards agility, and it makes combat a lot more fun. Might not be optimal for everyone, but I recommend giving it a try. It seems awkward at first to try and slim things down, but once you're in the middle of a fight it starts making sense.
 

WeComeInPeace

WeComeInPeace
The "Movement profile" is also a good tool when playing around in Coriolis:

1579132793158.png


In this case (highly tuned Eagle) 29 is yaw, 80 is pitch and 191 is roll. For combat all are important to get as high as possible, but personally I find pitch (and downward thrust) most important. This Eagle can flip on a coin and then boost in any direction you choose with FA on. It's still too fast for my limited reaction and reflexes, but it's really fun to fly.
 
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