Engineers Getting Elite rank in combat to unlock Petra Olmanova

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Addendum: If you drop the engineering of the shield generator to G3 (which is pretty easy to achieve), it's even worse for thermal shields:

Thermal resistant G3: Raw 1133, with PIPs 2833, Kinetic 3895, Thermal 3926, Explosive 5235.
Reinforced G3: Raw 1427, with PIPs 3569, Kinetic 6141, Thermal 3869, Explosive 7369.

In that case, reinforced is on par with thermal (57 MJ difference!) and much better in every other stat.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

I would have engineered the shields for thermal resistance.

Your shield thermal resistance is -5.4% which is really low for a PvE combat ship. If you have the mats I would recommend:

• Change the shields to G3 thermal (or better)
• Engineer a shield booster to G3 thermal (or better)
• Engineer the other two shield boosters to G3 resistance augmented (or better)

This would get your thermal resistance to 42%. This is good, and if you have the mats to G4 the shields it will go to 50%. Which is great. Good shields means you can fight more aggressively and sloppy without worrying about damage.

Just to hammer the point home: This is actual bad advice. Here are the numbers of G3 thermal shields with one G3 thermal and two G3 resistance augmented boosters vs. G3 reinforced with two HD boosters and one thermal booster (again, numbers for four PIPs in SYS, as calculated by EDSY for the above linked Anaconda; other ships may vary):

Thermal G3: raw 836, PIPs 2092, kinetic 3631, thermal 3581, explosive 4880
Reinforced G3: raw 1427, PIPs 3569, kinetic 6141, thermal 3869, explosive 7369

In other words, the reinforced setup gives you 170/170/169/108/151 percent (raw/PIPs/kinetic/thermal/explosive) protection over your proposed thermal generator with resistance boosters. Please don't tell me I give bad advice when you obviously have not crunched the numbers.

And for balance sake, I did mention the price of build and recharge times. If your goal is a shield that you expect to drop at some point for one reason or another (like when you plan to use silent running and you need them to come back up quickly), then yes, weak base shields with high resistances will work better. But that's more an edge case than your average combat build, and I would say "but quick recharge times!" is moving the goal post.

And with that, I am out of the discussion. The numbers are there, I made my arguments, decide for yourself.

 

[Greasetrap42]

Again, twisting my words. I didn't say "forget about resistances"

I'm, not twisting any words. In the context of this thread where a new player is building a ship and I gave suggestions to pay attention to shield resistances, you disagreed and actually recommended raw shield values over resistances... in the context of this thread.

I don't know about "traditional" (what is traditional anyway?)

As said, I can't quickly find any build guide that recommends a new player still in player progression stages of building ships to forego shield resistances in favor of raw shield values. I'm sure there might be some... I just can't find them. Particularly at lower combat ranks a PvE combat player will be faced with enemies primarly thermal and kinetic weapons. Not plasma and rail guns. Later on when their combat rank is higher and they can have a G5 shield generator and 6-7 G5 engineered shield boosters certainly it opens up to more good ideas.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Re-read my posts. It's all G3 engineering, which is doable for early players, certainly doable for OP. At this point I assume you're purposely ignoring the maths. But you do you.

 

[Greasetrap42]

Re-read my posts. It's all G3 engineering, which is doable for early players, certainly doable for OP. At this point I assume you're purposely ignoring the maths. But you do you.

Yes I am ignoring your math for three reasons:

1. I know how to use EDSY.

2. You are presenting shield resistances as hit point values which they are not.

3. It is not worth my time to look at your math. See point #1.


Certainly there are several methods to achieve good balanced shield resistances. I posted my preferred method for this application, there are other methods. And maybe your method is great. doesn't matter. Instead of explaining to the OP the value of shield resistances and a your good method you decided to explain that raw shield values are of greater value than worrying about shield resistances. Talking about plasma weapons and gankers, blah blah blah. Maybe you circled back in your subsequent posts with you 'maths', at this point Idc. And this discussion is not helpful to the OP. Unless he learned something about shield resistances.

 

[Codger]

You know you only need Expert rank in combat for Petra, right? Not Elite.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

2. You are presenting shield resistances as hit point values which they are not.

that's exactly what they are. The shield values for each damage type EDSY and Coriolis calculate are equivalent (Coriolis calls then "effective" shields for a reason). Go to Coriolis, take a stock Anaconda, and put nothing on it other than a 7C bi-weave, once with G3 thermal and once with G3 reinforced, and then look at the defense values. The shields will have the same effective thermal value (while the reinforced has better protection against everything else) and hold for exactly the same time against a stock eagle (which only does thermal damage). That*s what "effective" and "equivalent" means.

1. I know how to use EDSY.

Are you sure?

 

[Greasetrap42]

2. You are presenting shield resistances as hit point values which they are not.

that's exactly what they are

Absolutely incorrect. Shield resistances are a percent reduction of incoming damage. That is exactly what they are. Unlike raw shield strength (hitpoints), resistances prevent damage from ever occurring, and no regen time is associated with the resistance. Resistances are not a form of hitpoints.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Resistances aren't magic. All they do is effectively supply multipliers to your base shields. They don't prevent damage from happening, they buff your shields. And I did talk about the difference in recharge time, but that is not the point. Don't move the goalpost.

But I should heed my own advice. Have fun.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Absolutely incorrect. Shield resistances are a percent reduction of incoming damage. That is exactly what they are. Unlike raw shield strength (hitpoints), resistances prevent damage from ever occurring, and no regen time is associated with the resistance. Resistances are not a form of hitpoints.

Regeneration is a definite advantage of a resistance build - but not with an Anaconda, where you're going to be near-constantly getting hit during the fight because you're flying a giant slow target (and if you aren't, the fine details of shields are irrelevant because your opponents are massively outclassed anyway) or in a RES (where you can accept slower recharges between engagements)

If you ignore the benefits to regeneration, though, you can model resistance as another form of hit points - which is what Coriolis' defence tab does, or the STR column on EDSY, because it's a very common way to think about builds (and indeed to compare hull and shield strength on the same scale).

1000 base shield, 50% thermal resistance, will take 2000 incoming thermal damage before collapsing.
2000 base shield, 0% thermal resistance, will take the same 2000 incoming thermal damage before collapsing. (but rather more non-thermal damage than the other shield)

That 2000 incoming thermal damage isn't exactly 2000 HP, but it's a reasonable first-pass comparison for a floating brick. Flying a hit-and-run Viper or even something larger but still agile like a FDL, sure, then the regen rate makes a difference and you don't need to worry so much about plasma fire because you shouldn't be getting hit with it much to start with.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Regeneration is a definite advantage of a resistance build - but not with an Anaconda, where you're going to be near-constantly getting hit during the fight because you're flying a giant slow target (and if you aren't, the fine details of shields are irrelevant because your opponents are massively outclassed anyway) or in a RES (where you can accept slower recharges between engagements)

If you ignore the benefits to regeneration, though, you can model resistance as another form of hit points - which is what Coriolis' defence tab does, or the STR column on EDSY, because it's a very common way to think about builds (and indeed to compare hull and shield strength on the same scale).

1000 base shield, 50% thermal resistance, will take 2000 incoming thermal damage before collapsing.
2000 base shield, 0% thermal resistance, will take the same 2000 incoming thermal damage before collapsing. (but rather more non-thermal damage than the other shield)

That 2000 incoming thermal damage isn't exactly 2000 HP, but it's a reasonable first-pass comparison for a floating brick. Flying a hit-and-run Viper or even something larger but still agile like a FDL, sure, then the regen rate makes a difference and you don't need to worry so much about plasma fire because you shouldn't be getting hit with it much to start with.

Exactly my point

 

[Greasetrap42]

I am quite surprised at the misinformation on this thread. Lets be clear:

1. Ignoring Shield Resistances: Bad

• Telling new players to forgo shield resistances in favor of raw shield hit points is not good advice for a typical PvE combat ship. This is what was originally recommended by @Helmut Grokenberger . talk in all the circles you want, that was your recommendation.
• A search of the internet and I can't find any build guide that suggests going with this is a good idea.

2. Reasonably Balanced Shield Resistances: Good

• For a PvE combat ship build you can design a ship to focus on high shield resistances or raw shield strength, but in both cases having reasonably balanced shield resistance is the norm.
• Every build guide I find recommends this. Arguing against this isn't just arguing against me. It is arguing against general mainstream thought.

3. Shield Resistances Are Not Hit Points.

• You can pretend they are... but they are not. They are incoming damage modifiers.
• EDSY and Coriolis display "effective' hit points along with the resistances. This is for visualization. In reality ships have 'damage on' and 'damage off' times. Usually a cmdr has some control over this. If a PvE ship is taking uncontrolled non-stop continuous damage to the point of shield collapse the cmdr has let things get out of control. Perhapd left the game ... AFK? Anyway, resistances are not hit points.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Just because I feel grossly and purposefully misrepresented and misquoted, let the record show that I did not say "forget about resistances", I mentioned plugging the thermal hole in the resistance multiple times. I also mentioned the downside of longer recharge times for stronger base shields twice. And stated that in builds where you can take advantage of recharge times lower base shields and higher resistances can make sense. As Ian mentioned, the Conda is no such build.

and one thermal booster with thermo block to plug the thermal resistance hole you have in the shields.

A reinforced shield with the thermal hole plugged (via thermal booster or resistance augmented, depends a bit - on some builds I even get away with just HD/SC boosters as long as I get the thermal resistance in the plus) will give you a few MJ short of what thermal resistant shields will give you, but your other resistances against kinetic, explosive or absolute damage will be much, much stronger.

The downside is, of course, that the build and regen time go up by about 30 seconds - that's the nature of a large MJ pool. But that's okay for PvE in RES sites, you can disengage and recharge easily if needed.

In general, you want very strong base stats, especially with a slow moving whale like the conda.

And for balance sake, I did mention the price of build and recharge times. If your goal is a shield that you expect to drop at some point for one reason or another (like when you plan to use silent running and you need them to come back up quickly), then yes, weak base shields with high resistances will work better.

Now I'm really out. I hope. I know. I'm weak. Sue me.

 

[Noonien Soong]

You know you only need Expert rank in combat for Petra, right? Not Elite.

Thats right. For some reason I put elite in the caption. But I know it's expert

 

[Noonien Soong]

I went to Lei Cheung to engineer the shield boosters. One is grade 3 thermal, one is grade 3 resistance augmented and one is grade 1 resistance augmented. Then I went to Jameson Memorial to install 8E sensors. This is my Anaconda now:

EDSY

EDSY is a ship outfitting tool for Elite Dangerous

edsy.org

I went to a resource extraction site to scan for ships that are wanted but not in a team and attack them:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgQHJ10jhGE


I tried to control pips as best as I could. As I look back I see there are not enough pips in sys. I didn't take damage though. I got Tod the blaster upgraded to grade 5 now.

 

[Noonien Soong]

I gathered all the information I learned about combat and unlocking tod the blaster in a lil tutorial:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhA_77GR5EQ

 

[Codger]

I gathered all the information I learned about combat and unlocking tod the blaster in a lil tutorial:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhA_77GR5EQ

It's nice to see someone so excited about the game, nice job.