oh and the scout is almost twice as expensive
Is Cobra mk5 op?
- Thread starter S0rkvild
- Start date
Come on, let's not pretend it isn't essentially superior to all other small class ships in every way. Take the Imperial Courier, for example; the Cobra has more firepower, better speed, better armor, better shields, better cargo capacity, better jump range, AND it's SCO-optimized. And it's cheaper, on top of all that. There's zero reason to ever bother using a Courier when the Cobra Mk5 exists.
Broadly speaking, when it comes to things like this, performance increases linearly but cost increases exponentially. In this case, you're looking at a ship that's something like 25-50% better in every regard - it should rightfully cost 10x-50x more.
Otherwise all the other small ships in the game could as well be outright deleted from the game entirely.
I'm not asking for it to cost a billion credits - just enough that players at least should use something else for a bit. And with current profit margins, that's somewhere in the hundred million credit range.
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Are you guys familiar with how modern cars emit less, are more efficient, and offer better safety and capabilities over an 80 year old car? They even come in electric, now.
That is how it's supposed to work. In the same way we are fortunate to travel between countries in air conditioned, pressured aircraft, and not DC 9's that take an entire week hopping between small airfields.
If the existing ships need some work, then that's way more productive, brings the rest of the ships in better focus and is considerably more beneficial than pearl clutching at some new ships and deciding we really all ought to be riding pony and carriage again. Frontier have already hinted there might be some power (plant) related improvements.
Maybe give them a chance to move forward with the improvements? See how it shakes down.
A number of ships have been fringe use for about 7 years. All the new ships have done, is make that obvious.
That is how it's supposed to work. In the same way we are fortunate to travel between countries in air conditioned, pressured aircraft, and not DC 9's that take an entire week hopping between small airfields.
If the existing ships need some work, then that's way more productive, brings the rest of the ships in better focus and is considerably more beneficial than pearl clutching at some new ships and deciding we really all ought to be riding pony and carriage again. Frontier have already hinted there might be some power (plant) related improvements.
Maybe give them a chance to move forward with the improvements? See how it shakes down.
A number of ships have been fringe use for about 7 years. All the new ships have done, is make that obvious.
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Some ships were validated by their price, but well, we know what happened with that.
It's massively power limited. If all you're doing with it is filling it with multi-cannons, heatsinks and cargo racks, then no issue, but if you want to put power-hungry equipment in all those lovely slots, then you're very quickly going to have to start making difficult choices. The Vulture has the same Power Plant limits, but fewer hardpoints and internals to worry about, and the luxury of a Class 5 Distro which makes things a lot easier to actually use in a fight.
From a balance perspective the only thing I'd say, and it won't make any difference to anyone in this thread, is that 2 million is silly low price. It should be the most expensive small ship, a little more expensive than the Vulture a little less than the Asp Explorer.
For me, the other small ships haven't been made irrelevant by the Cobra V, they've been made irrelevant by the Medium ships and the game not having many use cases where Small is useful enough to make the difference. The Vulture is still a valid choice over it for certain roles/loadouts. If you want pure speed the Cobra V can't usefully employ the Enhanced Performance thrusters, so the Courier and Eagles will still out pace it. The Dolphin runs a lot colder and can take those Luxury Passengers. The DBX massively outclasses it in jump range, and has a slightly higher Armour Hardness stat.
I've been having some fun trying to get a practical AX build to fit in the Power budget without being super hot, but I doubt I'm achieving much that couldn't be done more easily in a Vulture with Large Azimuth AX Multi-cannons. In the future I'll probably use it for running Odyssey missions, as the Small landing pad requirement does actually come up from time to time, and makes life that bit easier. If I really want to do something BEST, I can get another ship to do it better than the Cobra V. Usually a Medium ship.
From a balance perspective the only thing I'd say, and it won't make any difference to anyone in this thread, is that 2 million is silly low price. It should be the most expensive small ship, a little more expensive than the Vulture a little less than the Asp Explorer.
For me, the other small ships haven't been made irrelevant by the Cobra V, they've been made irrelevant by the Medium ships and the game not having many use cases where Small is useful enough to make the difference. The Vulture is still a valid choice over it for certain roles/loadouts. If you want pure speed the Cobra V can't usefully employ the Enhanced Performance thrusters, so the Courier and Eagles will still out pace it. The Dolphin runs a lot colder and can take those Luxury Passengers. The DBX massively outclasses it in jump range, and has a slightly higher Armour Hardness stat.
I've been having some fun trying to get a practical AX build to fit in the Power budget without being super hot, but I doubt I'm achieving much that couldn't be done more easily in a Vulture with Large Azimuth AX Multi-cannons. In the future I'll probably use it for running Odyssey missions, as the Small landing pad requirement does actually come up from time to time, and makes life that bit easier. If I really want to do something BEST, I can get another ship to do it better than the Cobra V. Usually a Medium ship.
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Exactly.
Things like the CM3, Adder, Hauler, T6 etc were all the product of an economy that paid you maybe a thousand credits for data delivery missions.
Now, you first visit to a station in the newbie zone can set you up with enough data delivery missions to earn a couple of million credits.
If FDev really want to avoid a lot of "newbie" ships becoming completely redundant, they need to find a way to incorporate them into the whole "colonisation" thing.
Like I keep saying, make it so new colonies only have small pads until they're established and then revise the stat's of various small ships to make them useful for different things.
The only thing keeping those ships valid these days is the first few hours of gameplay where you don't really have many credits or know how to make them. A player could spend 10-20 hours in a T6 or other ship before figuring out the better ways of making money.
I dunno, maybe 100m is too expensive, but at least like 10m-20m, so you have SOME reason to use something else for a bit. You will still come back to the cobra mk 5 later on for Odyssey content.
I reckon let people make their own decisions about which ships, when, etc. Clearly Frontier are prioritising adding content and improving the experience over fixated nerfing of ships. Which is a nice change of pace. Making people use poorly thought out ships, because doesn't really stand up to scrutiny.
One of the single best handling ships in the game, is the Sidewinder. It's also the first ship people are given. Frontier intended for people to have a good time.
Indeed, I believe the Cobra Mk V would encourage people to spend more time with small ships rather than not use them at all. So on balance, it potentially will keep more people in small ships more often. Which, surely, cannot be a bad thing.
And on that note, I think I shall move on. o/
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Vulture has large hardpoints though, and size 5 distro and that alone makes it already quite close in terms of combat ability. And it comes with higher hull hardness as well, so its being more suited to take beating, than C5, from variety of weapons.
In other hand, most of combat small sized ships can be faster than C5, especially PVP courier with speed focus. Like 50-80 m/s or even more faster and such can make an diffrence who's gonna win or lose. Surely less firepower, and worse defences, but faster neverless, and that alone might appeal to many cmdrs - wich is why it wont totally dominate meta for small ships - as there quite few reasons, why small ships are not ones that are dominating space lanes.
I does not.
I dont own C5 yet, but I dont really mind it being better than any older ship that is small sized, as its meant to be like that. Given its small size, it has usual limitations that comes with that. Its not I-win ship, but surely an ship that is some worth even for end-game players, PVP or not, while most of small ships dont.
From what I can tell, C5 cant really take advantage of its internals, well as number of hardpoints and utility slots, due of powerplant limitations, wich forces to make certain bulids, and there is already very good counters against those bulids.
This is a fair summation of the whole topic.
I would just add, that if we are happy with the idea of FDev continuing to add new ships to the game (regardless whether Arx are involved) then we have to expect that each new ship will have something about it that will make an older ship look less appealing. That said, even if a ship is the best at zero tasks it isn't 'redundant', in the sense that as long as NPC pilots are using them they still add variety to the galaxy, and they are always there for players that enjoy their aesthetics or want to use off-meta ships to challenge themselves. Such as using Haulers for AX combat.
Whether or not Frontier is improving the experience is definitely opinion.
Agree. Similar to the Vulture I’ve had to stick with 0E shield boosters to save power to make the weapons worthwhile. A couple of GSRPs fills in the missing MJ, thanks to the abundance of optional internals.
I'm counting on that. Some stat buffs here and there or perhaps one more extra internal, this would make remaining smalls quite attractive again. In my opinion great speed should be their strongest side, simply small ships outrun larger ones.
My God - It's a nippy little thing!
Do you mean convergence?
Because from what I can see, the DPS of the Cobra V is pretty insane too!
Vulture:
Cobra MkV:
Excuse me guys - I'm off to buy myself a new Cobra now! o7
It's nice but pretty OP imo.Cool ship, but I don't know if FDev didn't overdo it by making the agility and controllability of this ship arcade-level? Better agility by 20 points than Eagle.
Not that I'm nitpicking, but do we want new ships to go in the direction where they're super easy easy to control and literally have no flaws? Each of the previous ships had some quirks, smaller or bigger, and that made them interesting, leaving a lot of room for experimentation. This one had this, that one had that, etc.
And we get a ship that beats the Eagle and Vulture in agility, speed, etc. Boost acceleration beats other ships hands down, top speed with full armor and weapons - wow. And... those insane lateral thrusters.
I regret that a bit, because I like small ships and I had each one for special tasks, because each one is unique in something. And here I get a ship that's better at everything. I know I don't have to fly it, but... those previous ships look pale in comparison and in fact in your game you can limit yourself only to ships that came out this year, right?
Many new players will ask - what small ship would you recommend? Of course everyone will write that Cobra mk5. Because this ship simply beats everything in its category hands down. Previously there were different opinions. For example, take Vulture for combat, some recommended Cobra mk3 others Viper 4 or DBS. So, it's a bit of a shame that few people will recommend other flavors, when the meta ship is within reach, you can't blame them for that.
And what is your opinion, is Cobra mk5 too good for a small ship and don't you feel control of Cobra mk5 feels too arcade?
At the least FDEV should have decreased the agility as the ship becomes heavier.
During a pirate wing assassination mission, the elite pirate fdl got my hull down to %98 or %99 on my shieldless hulltank build. Basically this ship renders current pve (aside from ax) combat a stroll in the park.
I am considering mkb with my feet.
It kind of makes sense from an in-universe perspective: Technology advances, and the different ship manufacturers are trying to outperform each other with their new ships, developing more advanced technology.
Can't wait for it to be released (for credits). Definitely going to get one and pimp it out for combat.