Engineer question - fast recharge vs higher "capacity"

[Skarik]

Ive been Flying arround the galaxy for a while now with a question in Mund i just cant explain.
Engineer Upgrade faster recharge on the Energy distributor:
Recharge weapons obviously
Recharge ENG is obvious too
But how does faster recharge affect SYS? Id guess if 1 of the shield-rings are gone, that recharge to bring it back up?
Now a higher capacity, 2 questions:
Higher capacity in ENG? Stronger boost or longer boost?
What does a higher SYS capacity increase ? Overall Shield strength or reduced damage?

 

[Techup]

Afaik your shields don't charge any faster regardless of pips. It has set recharge speed. More pips only means stronger shields.


With that said, when a shield does take damage and is recharging it draws from the sys. Everything does like chaff for example. A faster charge simply means you'd need less pips to keep things like the shield regenerating or chaff functioning with power because the charge will out charge the power draw from those devices.

No charge increase, you might need 2 or 3 pips to support chaff and shield functioning and whatever else, but with a higher charge rate you may only need 1. This is just a rough example and I could be wrong but this is how I believe it functions.

Edit - high capacity just means it can draw longer without needing to be recharged.

 

[Skarik]

Afaik your shields don't charge any faster regardless of pips. It has set recharge speed. More pips only means stronger shields.


With that said, when a shield does take damage and is recharging it draws from the sys. Everything does like chaff for example. A faster charge simply means you'd need less pips to keep things like the shield regenerating or chaff functioning with power because the charge will out charge the power draw from those devices.

No charge increase, you might need 2 or 3 pips to support chaff and shield functioning and whatever else, but with a higher charge rate you may only need 1. This is just a rough example and I could be wrong but this is how I believe it functions.

Edit - high capacity just means it can draw longer without needing to be recharged.

I See so like a Battery. Nice finally answered. Tho makes a high capacity kinda useless unless i dont know like a cobra that Hits and runs.
Tho what about a higher "battery" in ENG?

 

[Techup]

Higher capacity would just mean you'd have more bars to boost but recharge rate is much more effective. The rate at which they charge or the capacity doesn't affect speed, damage or shields for each. Charge or capacity just means you can use them longer before they need to be recharged or charge them faster to require less pips to maintain them.

 

[blitzfreigabe]

The faster recharge will have an affect on your shield recharge in specific situations. If you have your pips towards weapons and your shields/utility modules start chewing through the 1 or less pipped SYS batteries, the recharge will improve the ability to recharge the "batteries" with fewer pips and if you add pips, the recharge of the batteries will be faster. as far as I can tell in my theory crafting that I've done on Corialus, Recharge > Capacity for most part. just my 2 Cr.

 

[DustyArne]

i am a little unsure, but, i do believe more pips to sys does actually give you faster shields recharge speed.. And im sure it will regenerate shields more quickly.

 

[GoldenSilver484]

i am a little unsure, but, i do believe more pips to sys does actually give you faster shields recharge speed.. And im sure it will regenerate shields more quickly.

Additional pips will only affect shield recharge rates if the capacitor is empty. For example a Cutter or T-9 with a class 8 biweave can't maintain the capacitor drain if they go down and start recharging, even with four pips, however the shields will come back online faster with four pips than with three. Once they're back up the drain returns to normal and you can usually maintain them with one or two pips.

Although they are able to resist up to 58% of damage when four pips are in systems. I think three gives you ~38%, two gives you ~23% and one gives you <10%. There's a graph some Cmdrs made after testing it, though I'm too lazy to try to find it.

Shields do recharge faster when out of combat or in supercruise, they don't use additional systems energy to do this.

 

[I PORKCH0P I]

Additional pips will only affect shield recharge rates if the capacitor is empty. For example a Cutter or T-9 with a class 8 biweave can't maintain the capacitor drain if they go down and start recharging, even with four pips, however the shields will come back online faster with four pips than with three. Once they're back up the drain returns to normal and you can usually maintain them with one or two pips.

Although they are able to resist up to 58% of damage when four pips are in systems. I think three gives you ~38%, two gives you ~23% and one gives you <10%. There's a graph some Cmdrs made after testing it, though I'm too lazy to try to find it.

Shields do recharge faster when out of combat or in supercruise, they don't use additional systems energy to do this.

This is the way I understand it as well for what it's worth.

 

[Mr. Stevens Catering]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrSXvCEergY

pips to shields

 

[Wyaston Hypatia]

My totally untested, thought is that:
Faster recharge - better for a fighter.
Higher capacity - better for a runner.

 

[Codger]

There's a lot of misinformation about how the SYS, ENG, and WEP capacitors work floating around, and it doesn't help that they each have a "hidden" effect as well, that differs between each.

Here's my best understanding of it all, gleaned from experience and experiment and discussion with others. I may still be missing something but I think this is pretty close.

SYS - the bars of the capacitor have to be at least partially filled in order for the shield to charge/recharge. How many bars doesn't affect the rate of shield charge/regen, it's just a holding tank for energy that the shield (and other systems) can draw from. The hidden effect of SYS pips is shield strength -- more pips equals more strength. But it does not affect regen rate.

ENG - the bars of the capacitor are (mostly) used for boosting. If you boost you'll deplete the capacitor and can't boost again until it's refilled. The hidden effect of ENG is maneuverability. More pips to ENG makes your ship pitch/yaw/roll faster, as well as move faster.

WEP - the bars of the capacitor are used for all weapons -- each one drains the capacitor when fired (at varying rates, according to the distributor draw of the weapon). If you run out of bars, you can't shoot. The hidden effect of WEP is thermal control -- less overheating with 4 pips to WEP. It doesn't affect damage directly (but of course if you run out and can't shoot well then...).

Boiling this down into the OP's question, the answer is that recharging the capacitors is the most important part. The capacity has to be sufficient to serve as a holding tank or buffer, but as long as the capacitor is recharged faster than it's drained, capacity is secondary.

Having tried the various Engineer effects, I can state from experience that Charge Enhanced Grade 5 is the ultimate. It makes a huge difference.

Hope that helps a bit.

 

[Alex Brentnall]

To answer the question:

If you run a high single usage build like an Anaconda with 5 plasma accelerators you may want to run a high capacity mod so you can fire all weapons in one big hit then work on avoidance and defence whilst it recharges. These ship builds are the ones that look to take out their opponent in 1 or 2 heavy salvos so recharge doesn't matter as much as projecting as much force as quickly as possible.

Most cases you will want high recharge rate though as Elites combat is largely attrition/movement based keeping yourself out of their fire arc and the enemy within yours. As a result high recharge allows pips to be moved to Eng/Sys without affecting you as much which in turn means a more effective ship in defence as well as attack if used right.