Is the SLF fighter just REALLY bad early on or am I doing something wrong?

[CoyoteXStarrk]

I am grinding assassination missions in Rhea for Rep at the moment and I decided to try out the SLF on my Conda. So i went out and did what all the guides suggested and grabbed a harmless pilot to level up and so far I am having trouble telling whether or not she is actually doing anything at all. I get that she is harmless right now so I should temper my expectations, but just to see how she was doing I intentionally left a sidewinder at 2% health with no shields and stopped firing my guns so my SLF could kill it.........but she never did. I sat there for a good 3 minutes watching her fly around trying to shoot the Sidey and she did not hit it once. Not a single percentage drop on the Sidey.

- I have the Taipan

- Its the Gimballed Pulse Taipan

- I set her to either engage at will or attack a certain target at the start of every fight


Am I doing something wrong? Did I pick the wrong fighter? Wrong loadout? Or is the SLF just REALLY bad early on and I just need to wait until she levels up more?

 

[Aashenfox]

They do better in the Fed fighter, I forget what it's called, but yes, under Expert, they are simply really bad. The gimballed pulse is probably the lowest dps of the lot. If you can shoot and want to fly it yourself, the plasma would be my choice, but if mixed use (sometimes you, sometimes the NPC), you want the Fed fighter and you always want the fixed beam variants. Think of them as a distraction rather than dps until they reach master.

 

[Watcher]

I am grinding assassination missions in Rhea for Rep at the moment and I decided to try out the SLF on my Conda. So i went out and did what all the guides suggested and grabbed a harmless pilot to level up and so far I am having trouble telling whether or not she is actually doing anything at all. I get that she is harmless right now so I should temper my expectations, but just to see how she was doing I intentionally left a sidewinder at 2% health with no shields and stopped firing my guns so my SLF could kill it.........but she never did. I sat there for a good 3 minutes watching her fly around trying to shoot the Sidey and she did not hit it once. Not a single percentage drop on the Sidey.

- I have the Taipan

- Its the Gimballed Pulse Taipan

- I set her to either engage at will or attack a certain target at the start of every fight


Am I doing something wrong? Did I pick the wrong fighter? Wrong loadout? Or is the SLF just REALLY bad early on and I just need to wait until she levels up more?

Interesting, I've found the SLF to be pretty useful - if only as a distraction while I run away...
When not just running away it has generally done a decent job of causing some damage so I'm not sure what is going on there.
I'm mostly using a fixed beam Taipan but I'd imagine that has more trouble hitting a small target.
Might be worth filing a bug report, even a rookie pilot should be able to hit a Sidey once or twice after several minutes

 

[CoyoteXStarrk]

Interesting, I've found the SLF to be pretty useful - if only as a distraction while I run away...
When not just running away it has generally done a decent job of causing some damage so I'm not sure what is going on there.
I'm mostly using a fixed beam Taipan but I'd imagine that has more trouble hitting a small target.
Might be worth filing a bug report, even a rookie pilot should be able to hit a Sidey once or twice after several minutes

Yeah I thought I might, but before I did I wanted to make sure that it wasn't something that I was doing. Maybe try another Pilot? Mine is still Harmless so getting rid of her would mean I lose nothing.

Or maybe try another fighter?

Maybe both? lol

 

[Aashenfox]

Interesting, I've found the SLF to be pretty useful - if only as a distraction while I run away...
When not just running away it has generally done a decent job of causing some damage so I'm not sure what is going on there.
I'm mostly using a fixed beam Taipan but I'd imagine that has more trouble hitting a small target.
Might be worth filing a bug report, even a rookie pilot should be able to hit a Sidey once or twice after several minutes

Definitely not worth a bug report, imo. Remember the first time you flew out of the statoin? Or the first time you did the tutorial? Did you hit the enemy much? Harmless NPCs are just that, utterly harmless. On the bright side, one ammo load in the HAZRES can level them up twice. Assassinations is THE worst way to level them up, 5 minute single kills compared to multiple high level kills in the hazres.

On the bright side, at Deadly+, they are SUPER effective. In fact they need a nerf at those levels, they are more powerful than an NPC Eagle/Sidey

 

[Watcher]

Yeah I thought I might, but before I did I wanted to make sure that it wasn't something that I was doing. Maybe try another Pilot? Mine is still Harmless so getting rid of her would mean I lose nothing.

Or maybe try another fighter?

Maybe both? lol

Until we have some actual RPG* elements I wouldn't worry about swapping out the pilot, so yeah, perhaps worth trying a different fighter.
As has been said the Fed fighter with the pulse cannon thing is pretty well balanced and might be a good thing to try.

* Hint hint FD.

 

[CoyoteXStarrk]

Definitely not worth a bug report, imo. Remember the first time you flew out of the statoin? Or the first time you did the tutorial? Did you hit the enemy much? Harmless NPCs are just that, utterly harmless. On the bright side, one ammo load in the HAZRES can level them up twice. Assassinations is THE worst way to level them up, 5 minute single kills compared to multiple high level kills in the hazres.

Oh okay I didn't know that. Thank you!

On the bright side, at Deadly+, they are SUPER effective. In fact they need a nerf at those levels, they are more powerful than an NPC Eagle/Sidey

Thats good to know. I am looking forward to it!

 

[SirBiggles]

I have just been through leveling 3 pilots from harmless to Master. From Harmless to Novice they are poor but can save your bacon as a distraction (Type 9 running from deadly anaconda on missions), from Competent to Expert they are starting to get useful in combat, At Master they are awesome and can hold their own 1v1. I'm really keen to see one of these at deadly or Elite
My advice is to get Gimballed Beam Condor for leveling them up. From expert onwards you can get them a Fixed weapon fighter. My personal favourite is Fixed Multicannon Condor. I don't recommend the Taipan it just seems too slow for only 5 shield points (25 vs 30). If you have a size 6 bay you can try out 2 different ones.
With money so easy to come by these days I have 3 of them trained up eating 7%+ 7% + 6% of my earnings and I don't even notice. If i lose one i think ill just hire from Expert from now on.

 

[Aashenfox]

Oh okay I didn't know that. Thank you!



Thats good to know. I am looking forward to it!

Most welcome Don't forget that they also steal your combat xp (the xp that counts toward your own Elite combat ranking). Where previously you get 1 point for killing an enemy the same combat rank as you, you will now only get half a point. There is also a bright side though, and it's the speed at which they level up, cos when they steal your half point, it's more like 10 points to them.

If you don't want to experiment a lot you don't need to. I always fit the same fighter, regardless...FIxed beam Taipan (I do more pvp than pve), it is simply the best overall, and by a fair margin. If you don't pvp at all, then go with the Fed fighter, but still go fixed beam. There's no need to look at any other, except for personal preference reasons.

 

[CoyoteXStarrk]

Most welcome Don't forget that they also steal your combat xp (the xp that counts toward your own Elite combat ranking). Where previously you get 1 point for killing an enemy the same combat rank as you, you will now only get half a point. There is also a bright side though, and it's the speed at which they level up, cos when they steal your half point, it's more like 10 points to them.

I really do not care about my Combat rank to be honest. The only thing I wanted to hit Elite in was Explorer. Combat has never been my main way of playing the game. I am just doing it as a change of pace after Trading my way to a Cutter for 3 months and exploration for a month and a half.

If I went back to trading or exploring right now I think I would eject myself out into the vacuum of space lol

 

[Wasp0]

Fighters are GREAT FUN..... My personal fave is the GU-91 with fixed beam. They are immensely useful in PvE and Pvp as well. For instance in a PvE scenario i will get my NPC fighter to engage first, and that ship then goes after the fighter. With a Deadly NPC he can dodge the fire, whilst complaining vehemently to you, but then you have the perfect opportunity to engage that target in your main ship with a deadly Alpha strike, thus causing the ship to switch his intentions to you and the fighter can recover and snipe the target.

If you are bored in a HazRes and you have a NPC pilot master/dangerous and above, then let them take the ship and you fly the fighter...Fun Fun Fun! with the Fixed Beam you can fire off a heatsink whilst firing the Beam and the distro never runs out whilst the heatsink is operating, you can literally strip a high level NPC ships shields with this fighter method.

TLDR: Fighters are FUN!

 

[Rock Hunter]

On the bright side, at Deadly+, they are SUPER effective. In fact they need a nerf at those levels, they are more powerful than an NPC Eagle/Sidey

I’ve zero experience with SLF fighters beyond using them myself with certain explorer builds for an escape from the norm so am curious about this comment.

Is it the SLF itself or the pilot skill that you think needs a nerf? I’m making an assumption from your comment that a Deadly+ pilot could easily take care of at least one npc Eagle/Sidey up to (or at least around) their level. Say taking on a wing with a couple of Eagles and a larger ship your SLF pilot can take down one, maybe even both, of the Eagle type ships whilst you concentrate on the large ship? If that is the case that is a big help and far more than the ‘distraction’ I often read about.

I’ve stayed away from SLF’s so they don’t take my XP away (I’m not quite Deadly yet so a long way to go) but at that sort of level it sounds as if they could very much speed up your ability to take down more ships, in a CNB for instance. Sometimes those small ships in wings of three are no real threat but a real nuisance that can become a threat if you don’t deal with them before moving on to another juicy target.

 

[GonzTheMalificent]

I may be imagining too much, but reading their Bio is a sign of how they are in combat, I've found.

I always hire harmless too, but the ones that boast about their kills always seem to rank-up faster than the ones that harp on about their humanitarian missions.

I had one recently the Bio said something about beating an epidemic, the Bee-atch ran away during a set-to with an engineered NPC Anaconda, and stayed out of the entire fight!

 

[Wasp0]

I may be imagining too much, but reading their Bio is a sign of how they are in combat, I've found.

I always hire harmless too, but the ones that boast about their kills always seem to rank-up faster than the ones that harp on about their humanitarian missions.

I had one recently the Bio said something about beating an epidemic, the Bee-atch ran away during a set-to with an engineered NPC Anaconda, and stayed out of the entire fight!

Interesting....never took much notice of the Bio before. Will put this to the test.

Nice one.

 

[Watcher]

Interesting....never took much notice of the Bio before. Will put this to the test.

Nice one.

Crikey, be interesting if there really were some RPG elements going on there and I didn't realise...

 

[Stealthie]

The Taipan is the best ship for newbie SLF pilots.
Put 'em in a Condor or a Gu-97 and they'll get smoked within seconds of launching.

I'd suggest taking a new SLF jockey to a CNB or HazRES and ranking them up to at least Dangerous before doing anything where you might actually expect them to be useful.
Really doesn't take long to get them to rank-up.

 

[CoyoteXStarrk]

I may be imagining too much, but reading their Bio is a sign of how they are in combat, I've found.

I always hire harmless too, but the ones that boast about their kills always seem to rank-up faster than the ones that harp on about their humanitarian missions.

I had one recently the Bio said something about beating an epidemic, the Bee-atch ran away during a set-to with an engineered NPC Anaconda, and stayed out of the entire fight!

Interesting....never took much notice of the Bio before. Will put this to the test.

Nice one.

Crikey, be interesting if there really were some RPG elements going on there and I didn't realise...

I hate to rain on the parade, but the pilot I have is a former member of the Federal Navy and brags about the number of medals she has in her bio and is absolute garbage. Hence why I made the thread in the first place lol

 

[Phoenix_Dfire]

I love the SLF, however the only way I've found to get them to level up quickly is go after thargoid scout. Managed to get a Pilot up to Dangerous before foolishly taking on an Inteceptor and loosing the T-10 to caustic Damage. Really wish you could buy Crew Insurance (i.e. an escape pod for NPCs) because it has a real X-Com 'They Killed Squadie Kenny!!! NOOOOOOOOO' moment.

 

[Watcher]

I hate to rain on the parade, but the pilot I have is a former member of the Federal Navy and brags about the number of medals she has in her bio and is absolute garbage. Hence why I made the thread in the first place lol

My hopes once again dashed.
Maybe... Or perhaps it is even deeper than this and they are telling a bit of a fib after being dishonorably discharged.
That seems a touch unlikely though

Setting aside RPG elements it would be nice if the bios made a bit more sense - highly decorated ex-military personel probably shouldn't be coming in at harmless and so on. You could argue they are capable but under-rated (because they didn't have a rating before) but then you'd want to see that in their behaviour - the difference between rated capability and actually capability. But then we are getting back in to RPG territory, oops.

 

[Aashenfox]

I’ve zero experience with SLF fighters beyond using them myself with certain explorer builds for an escape from the norm so am curious about this comment.

Is it the SLF itself or the pilot skill that you think needs a nerf? I’m making an assumption from your comment that a Deadly+ pilot could easily take care of at least one npc Eagle/Sidey up to (or at least around) their level. Say taking on a wing with a couple of Eagles and a larger ship your SLF pilot can take down one, maybe even both, of the Eagle type ships whilst you concentrate on the large ship? If that is the case that is a big help and far more than the ‘distraction’ I often read about.

I’ve stayed away from SLF’s so they don’t take my XP away (I’m not quite Deadly yet so a long way to go) but at that sort of level it sounds as if they could very much speed up your ability to take down more ships, in a CNB for instance. Sometimes those small ships in wings of three are no real threat but a real nuisance that can become a threat if you don’t deal with them before moving on to another juicy target.

At deadly and higher they can easily kill an npc of lower level (lower rank than dangerous). Regarding your example, if you order the fighter to first attack one and then the other, it might be able to keep both of them occupied while you focus on the medium ship in the wing, but the ai can only focus on one enemy at a time, and would get hit by the one ship while shooting the other. In this case, setting him to do as he pleases can help, as he will switch focus to the other ship when attacked and might be able to juggle them this way for quite some time. It also depends on the weaps the enemy is using. I will frequently send him off to kill an asp all on his own and leave him to it, he will usually destroy the other ship pretty quickly. Beware of equivalent level NPCs though.

Regarding what needs a nerf, is probably the ship, as the fixed beam is head and shoulders better than everything else when combined with the exceptional fixed aiming skills of high level ai.