Help with outfitting Corvette

[Cmdr Beteran]

My corvette has:
2 huge MCs, gimballed overcharged
1 large Beam, gimballed, efficient, thermal vent
2 medium Beam, fixed, efficient, thermal vent
2 small Beam, fixed, efficient, thermal vent

melts their shield, not your sanity or bank account.

I just changed my build as the one you mentioned above. Not done with G5 yet, so no chance for a test drive.

Before, i'd swapped MCs with Beams; Beams on huge, MCs on the rest. Shields were done pretty quick on opponents, it would take some time to crush the hull though.

Do you think your build -also my new build- will be able to kill the hull fast enough? Do you go all in with both beams and MCs to take down the shileds by the way?

 

[Stealthie]

Twin huge high yield cannons, and replaced the packhounds with LR burst lasers I had lying around. All gimballed as flying fixed with a gamepad is not much fun for me, except for PAs.

The lasers are a bit meh, but once shields drop and you sub target modules, the cannon absolutely ravages them. At times it takes 2-3 hits only to destroy them, it's quite comical really.

Interesting point regarding the cannons.

I went through a phase of wanting to like cannons but I always found the ammunition capacity too low.

I guess, really, the true niche for using cannons is as a "secondary" weapon for delivering module damage rather than as a primary means of exploding other ships.

My 2nd 'vette often gets used for dubious purposes.
I might consider one or more cannons to replace the C3 MC or the C2 Imp Hammers, just to see what happens after I break a target's shield.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

Interesting point regarding the cannons.

I went through a phase of wanting to like cannons but I always found the ammunition capacity too low.

I guess, really, the true niche for using cannons is as a "secondary" weapon for delivering module damage rather than as a primary means of exploding other ships.

My 2nd 'vette often gets used for dubious purposes.
I might consider one or more cannons to replace the C3 MC or the C2 Imp Hammers, just to see what happens after I break a target's shield.

Yeah I'm not sure I'll keep them long-term, but they can be fun.

When I returned to SD last night from my test session at V886 Centauri, I got pulled over by a Chieftan, who spammed chaff so my cannons were all but useless; the beams would've come in handy for sure though.

I also fought a Cobra Mk3 in the HazRes, and managed to disable most of its modules until I played football with the unresponsive ship - more effective getting its hull down as the cannons were pretty weak and I was relying on the MC's and lasers doing most of the work. Took a lot longer than expected to make it pop. Bigger ships, especially Condas, are really easy to take out, especially if you target the PP (after you made mince out of their FSD, meaning they can't run). That was pretty satisfying.

A few weeks ago I tried an all Cannon Chieftan build, that was pretty strong against PvE ships actually (not all were high yield iirc), but ammo was a bit of an issue if you wanted to stay out for longer.

 

[Tikanderoga]

I just changed my build as the one you mentioned above. Not done with G5 yet, so no chance for a test drive.

Before, i'd swapped MCs with Beams; Beams on huge, MCs on the rest. Shields were done pretty quick on opponents, it would take some time to crush the hull though.

Do you think your build -also my new build- will be able to kill the hull fast enough? Do you go all in with both beams and MCs to take down the shileds by the way?

In CZ, they are all heavily armored, everywhere else, you won't have a problem. And I don't even need 4 pips in Weapons. 2 -3 are plenty.
When I'm down to the hull, I mainly use the MCs but add some extra damage when they happen to walk into the crosshair.

As for the shields: I'm in no rush. I only add extra MCs vs shields when I see them popping an SCB and their shields are about to collapse, so I want to make sure they pop before the SCB kicks in. Else no.

 

[True Phoenix]

What's PvE?

 

[CMDR Karrde Sun]

What’s pvp?

I like long range beams or bursts. Now sure what literal effect fallout has, but it feels nice to know it doesn’t happen.

The crappy thing about beam lasers is they feel so unsatisfying to use... like somone drew a cheap 90s video game line with no effects. Not even a pew pew or a thump thump thump to go along with it.

 

[Cmdr Nemo]

This is myne; Because I only turn things on if and when the need or mission arises. I have considerably more power, thus I rarely ever have to put anymore than two pips to weapons. Never when combating small, on occasion when combating the larger mediums. Though I've never come up against a Vette or Cutter. I do have to put three pips if a Conda isn't going down quickly.
https://beta.coriolis.io/outfit/fed...OEBGaICmBDA5gGzSEAVgE4B2JEKKoA==&bn=War Wagon

 

[Tikanderoga]

What's PvE?

Player vs Environment. Means you are only playing against what the servers throw at you.
It's the opposite of PvP, means player vs player, where you can be facing some devious builds, people taking out your shield with a single torpedo and then have at the rest.
In PvE, that won't be the case as the AI doesn't use torpedoes to begin with.

 

[tolm]

Okay ... on further testing, the PAs were very rarely all hitting due to the width of the Corvette so I’ve reworked it for:

• 1x C4 Beam (Efficient / Thermal Vent)
• 2x C1 Beam (Efficient / Thermal Vent)
• 1x C4 MC (Overcharged / Autoloader)
• 2x C2 MC (Overcharged / Autoloader)
• 1x C3 PA (Focused)

That’s actually freed up some power for an additional Guardian Shield Reinforcement so now rocking 2,900MJ (raw) shields!!

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

Pretty darned impressive results ... only thing that took anything off the shields was a Clipper that was running seemingly infinite chaff!! Justified the PA in the C3 slot, though: damage not actually that impressive but good to have a fixed option that is good against shields AND hull until the chaff is gone and then unleash everything else again!!

 

[rrobes]

I've also tried different combos on my Corvette but always come back to four rails on the 1s and 2s, Hammers on the 2s with feedback and penetrators split evenly.

The rest are MCs with incendiary, thermal on the 4s and corrosive on the 3. The MCs are not power hungry and run relatively cool, allowing aggressive use of the rails.

The Hammers are a must, so align yourself with A. Lavigny-Duval and buy a bunch for now and later.

 

[Stealthie]

Okay ... on further testing, the PAs were very rarely all hitting due to the width of the Corvette so I’ve reworked it for:

• 1x C4 Beam (Efficient / Thermal Vent)
• 2x C1 Beam (Efficient / Thermal Vent)
• 1x C4 MC (Overcharged / Autoloader)
• 2x C2 MC (Overcharged / Autoloader)
• 1x C3 PA (Focused)

That’s actually freed up some power for an additional Guardian Shield Reinforcement so now rocking 2,900MJ (raw) shields!!

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

Pretty darned impressive results ... only thing that took anything off the shields was a Clipper that was running seemingly infinite chaff!! Justified the PA in the C3 slot, though: damage not actually that impressive but good to have a fixed option that is good against shields AND hull until the chaff is gone and then unleash everything else again!!

I'd say you're "wasting" those C1 slots.

When you've got a bunch of big weapons on a ship, the C1 slots don't add a lot in terms of "raw firepower".
It's far more useful to either use them for rails, missiles or turrets.
Use them for rails and they can infict significant damage, especially to big targets which, conveniently, will be moving slowly enough to allow you to hit them fairly easily.
Use them for missiles and they will, at least, inflict a bit more damage.
Use them for turrets and, regardless of the damage they inflict, they'll provide you with a reference as to where your target is.

I used to have a pair of C1 rails on my Corvette and they were pretty handy.
They were easy to aim and delivered reasonable damage.

I now have a combination of pulse/burst turrets with G5 long-range and the Emissive/Scramble Spectrum XFX.
They don't do a lot of damage but the Long range mod' means they're a great way to attract the attention of a target and bring them into range of my big guns, they don't require ammunition, they use almost no power which means they will carry on firing regardless of what pips I have set, they give me an idea of where my target is so I can steer my ship toward them and the combination of Emissive and Scramble Spectrum does a good job of messing up opponents' ships - especially useful when they pop and SCB and "go dark".

Also, I don't think you need to have so many Efficient lasers with the Thermal Vent XFX.
Efficient lasers, themselves, don't generate a lot of heat and if you're spamming the PA to generate heat, the Plasma Slug XFX will solve that.
Maybe the "problem" is that you've only engineered them to G3 thus far?
I'd suggest modding the C4 beams to G5 Efficient ASAP and then you'll find they don't heat up anything like as much.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

Switched around my weps to the following:

2x huge efficient beams with thermal vent (helps a bit when firing lots of pack-hounds) - they're still the daddy when it comes to melting shields
1x large LR pulse with scramble spectrum (am feeling I'm wasting the size 3 slot with this set up, but since the others are used the way they are, this will have to do)
2x medium high-capacity pack-hounds (230 missiles each - so they last a good while) - 1 is drag, 1 is emissive
2x small LR rails - 1 super-pen, 1 feedback cascade

I put these on 2 firegroups, where the lasers are on one, and the rails/missiles are on the secondary fire button respectively. Love it as it changes combat style a little - plus it allows me to 1) trash external modules 2) snipe internals and 3) take care of SCB spamming NPCs.

I'm slowly coming around to the idea that I don't need to fire all 7 hard points at the same time, constantly - the huge beams on their own do a lot of damage in most cases already, so the rest is more of a bonus.

 

[Stealthie]

I'm slowly coming around to the idea that I don't need to fire all 7 hard points at the same time, constantly - the huge beams on their own do a lot of damage in most cases already, so the rest is more of a bonus.

I think that's one of the main differences between PvP and PvE.

For PvP, it's all about the "devastating first-strike" and (usually) your only goal is to explode somebody.
When you run out of ammo' you synth' more or go back to a station and re-arm so you can do it again, and again, and again, and again....

For PvE, you're likely to have more diverse goals and so prolonged combat-effectiveness becomes important.
It's a PITA having something like a Corvette, schlepping out to a CZ or whatever, and being absolutely devastating for 10 minutes and then needing to synth' reloads or go home to re-arm.

C4 Efficient Beams, on a Corvette, will easily destroy 80% of the ships in the game by themselves - without using any ammunition at all.
You can sit in a CZ or RES perpetually, destroying ships, and never need to use an additional weapon if you don't want to.

Beyond that, it's all about optimising your efficiency.
Put MC's, rails, frags, PAs or cannons in some of the other slots, in a 2nd fire-group, and you can bring them on-line to give tough ships a good pasting and then you can switch back to the lasers and conserve all your other ammo until you need it again.

Also, to digress slightly, one of the reasons I prefer rails to PAs is that they make it easy to avoid squandering ammo.
With PAs it's easy to just keep plugging away with them and not hit much.
With Rails, the "spin up time" means you get a couple of seconds to think "am I still on target?" and take your finger off the trigger if you think you're going to miss.

 

[Deleted member 182079]

I think that's one of the main differences between PvP and PvE.

For PvP, it's all about the "devastating first-strike" and (usually) your only goal is to explode somebody.
When you run out of ammo' you synth' more or go back to a station and re-arm so you can do it again, and again, and again, and again....

For PvE, you're likely to have more diverse goals and so prolonged combat-effectiveness becomes important.
It's a PITA having something like a Corvette, schlepping out to a CZ or whatever, and being absolutely devastating for 10 minutes and then needing to synth' reloads or go home to re-arm.

C4 Efficient Beams, on a Corvette, will easily destroy 80% of the ships in the game by themselves - without using any ammunition at all.
You can sit in a CZ or RES perpetually, destroying ships, and never need to use an additional weapon if you don't want to.

Beyond that, it's all about optimising your efficiency.
Put MC's, rails, frags, PAs or cannons in some of the other slots, in a 2nd fire-group, and you can bring them on-line to give tough ships a good pasting and then you can switch back to the lasers and conserve all your other ammo until you need it again.

Also, to digress slightly, one of the reasons I prefer rails to PAs is that they make it easy to avoid squandering ammo.
With PAs it's easy to just keep plugging away with them and not hit much.
With Rails, the "spin up time" means you get a couple of seconds to think "am I still on target?" and take your finger off the trigger if you think you're going to miss.

Very true.

I rarely actively delve into PvP so far (apart from being on the receiving end of it so to speak), but recently, and when I had my dual-cannon set up on my Corvette, I was pulled by another player in a Chieftan and thought, let's not run and see how this pans out.

To be quite honest, I found it pretty dull, not only because I struggled to hit the other ship while we kept jousting (in itself not fun, worse so in a big ship I find) but progress was so slow I actually got bored of the procession.

In ship hardware terms, I had the advantage defensively (hull and shield tank hybrid with a couple of size 7 SCBs), while the other guy had the advantage offensively (weapons geared towards PvP, can't remember what exactly, and to be fair he was likely the better pilot). I managed to drop his shields once, and my phasing sequence PAs did some hull damage when they were up. But I didn't hit him often enough while I kept eating SCBs, so it must've been frustrating for him also.

Ended up low-waking twice (he interdicted me a second time, then gave up) to get on with what I originally wanted to do. And I wasted so much ammo in the process via missed or ineffective shots (cannons particularly), and ultimately nothing to show for, apart from mild initial excitement perhaps.

 

[tolm]

I'd say you're "wasting" those C1 slots.

When you've got a bunch of big weapons on a ship, the C1 slots don't add a lot in terms of "raw firepower".
It's far more useful to either use them for rails, missiles or turrets.
Use them for rails and they can infict significant damage, especially to big targets which, conveniently, will be moving slowly enough to allow you to hit them fairly easily.
Use them for missiles and they will, at least, inflict a bit more damage.
Use them for turrets and, regardless of the damage they inflict, they'll provide you with a reference as to where your target is.

I used to have a pair of C1 rails on my Corvette and they were pretty handy.
They were easy to aim and delivered reasonable damage.

I now have a combination of pulse/burst turrets with G5 long-range and the Emissive/Scramble Spectrum XFX.
They don't do a lot of damage but the Long range mod' means they're a great way to attract the attention of a target and bring them into range of my big guns, they don't require ammunition, they use almost no power which means they will carry on firing regardless of what pips I have set, they give me an idea of where my target is so I can steer my ship toward them and the combination of Emissive and Scramble Spectrum does a good job of messing up opponents' ships - especially useful when they pop and SCB and "go dark".

Also, I don't think you need to have so many Efficient lasers with the Thermal Vent XFX.
Efficient lasers, themselves, don't generate a lot of heat and if you're spamming the PA to generate heat, the Plasma Slug XFX will solve that.
Maybe the "problem" is that you've only engineered them to G3 thus far?
I'd suggest modding the C4 beams to G5 Efficient ASAP and then you'll find they don't heat up anything like as much.

Unfortunately, I only have access to G3 engineering on Beam lasers at the moment. I forget the exact series of hoops I need to jump through to unlock the series of engineers required for G5 but I suspect it involves mining 200T of something and/or combat bonds - neither of which I'm inclined to do!

Nonetheless ... your points on the Thermal Vent mod seem imminently sensible and I have in fact addressed those independently now (see below)

 

[GeneralIdea1964]

So it's not a thread asking for lots of credits?

 

[Morbad]

I forget the exact series of hoops I need to jump through to unlock the series of engineers required for G5 but I suspect it involves mining 200T of something and/or combat bonds - neither of which I'm inclined to do!

Fifty tons of rare tea!

 

[tolm]

Okay ... final (yeh, right!) round of tweaking!

- 1x C4 Beam Laser (G3 Efficient / Thermal Vent) + 2x C1 Pulse Laser (G4 Rapid Fire / special FX not done yet), all gimballed

These sit on the secondary trigger for all fire groups and are quite satisfying to use with the "pew pew" of the rapid fire pulses being far more interesting than the continual drone of the Beam. They make short work of shields, the Thermal Vent on the C4 Beam is more than enough to keep the heat under control and the Pulses have such a low power draw that the capacitor is nowhere near as strained as it was with 3 Beams.

All of which allows for ...

- 1x C4 Plasma Accelerator (G2 Focused / special FX not done yet but probably Plasma Slug when I have the mats)

The big guns are back! Well, one of 'em anyway. Way easier to hit with this than the under-nose mounted C3 and - of course - it does a shed load more damage. Also still just useful as a fixed weapon option if the enemies start spamming chaff! Sits on the primary fire trigger for my "Shields / Big Ships" fire group.

- 1x C3 MultiCannon (G5 Overcharged / AutoLoader) + 2x C2 MultiCannon (G5 Overchared / AutoLoader), all gimballed

That C3 slot seems to have most success with a MultiCannon - don't know why but seems to be able to stay on target better than a gimballed Beam or Pulse and - of course - no horrible pitching up to aim a fixed weapon m'larkey. It's also only ~9 DPS down vs the Huge MC I had before so not losing too much in order to get the big PA back! These sit on the primary trigger for my "Hull / Small Ships" fire group.

So far ... I may be starting to love my 'vette again! It's still annoyingly slow (yeh, yeh ... hoops to jump, Palin's to unlock ...) but now has massive shields and hull and the new weapon load out is very enjoyable: enough lasers to strip shields very quickly, the MCs are devastating against medium and small ships and it has the fun factor of the huge PA against large ships again. So far, the only things which have even scratched the shields are wings (where you have to kinda let one or two of 'em wail on you whilst you swat the flies!) or Deadly/Elite FAS and FDL pilots, where they're just a little too quick/agile to stay on 'em continuously but tough enough that they can get a few passes in. Still, losing 50% of one ring of shields isn't exactly an issue and I've taken out wings of three ships without losing that first ring entirely so it seems solid.

 

[Druner]

I fly most gimball pulse lazers with eficient and oversized. Plus two with scramble. Two huge multicannons, overcharged and one is corrosive.

Hope it helps.

 

[tolm]

Fifty tons of rare tea!

Well ... you say that .. but actually, to improve my lasers beyond their current G3 I would need to:

• Liz Ryder: Gain cordial/friendly status with Erybia Blue Mafia; Provide 200 Landmines; Reach grade 3/4
• Hera Tani: Gain Outside Rank with Empire; Provide 50 units of Rare Cigars; Reach grade 3/4
• Broo Tarquin: Reach Competent combat rank; Provide 50 units of Rare Tea; Reach Grade 4

Yeh ... that sounds like fun ...