If money's not an option, I would defo go with the IV. It may be slower, but it can go farther, and can take more punishement. If you're a good pilot though, it doesn't matter, in a III, you can stay behind just about any A.I. ship, and not have to worry about taking damage at all.
I clearly wouldn't be a good
combat pilot right now, per se, though in the Cobra I can hold my own against Pythons and the very occasional Anaconda (and until yesterday I completely forgot about subsystem targeting... so I've never taken out a Python or 'Conda via their powerplants). I'll be using gimballed weapons, so with some thoughtful positioning/initial attacks, hopefully the Viper IV's relative sluggishness won't harm my chances of keeping fire on a target.
And yeah, that edge on the jump range would be welcome, as I like the idea of taking a few courier type missions here and there as well. Right now the IV does seem more appealing.
Having flowing the Viper Mk lll for quite a while and flying the Mk IV for a bit, I would honestly buy them both and see which one you like better, you will lose some money depending which one you sell, but it will give you an idea on how they preform.
I hadn't considered that, and I suppose it does make sense. But is it particularly useful to compare the baseline performances of ships? I've only owned three so far (or two, ignoring the starter Sidewinder), but none have been notable right out of the shipyard. Then again I suppose the baseline cost of the III amounts to a very brief stint at a lowly RES.
I think that they are very similar, however I do prefer the Mk III over the Mk IV because of the manuverability and the speed, I think it can pull an easy 440 with A rated thrusters, if my memory serves me correctly.
Have you upgraded both roughly equally? If so, what weapons do you run on both, and how does power management compare? The wiki suggests neither are particularly heat or power efficient.
I assume not, on such short range fighters, but do you bother with a fuel scoop at all, to make longer journeys less demanding? I suppose it'd be one luxury too far on a mrk.III.
Viper MK4 flies like a heavy tank and pitches quite slow, but it IS a tank, it jumps very far even when maxed for combat and powers better weaponry - dual plasmas ahoy! Takes much more beating.
Yeah, I'm definitely leaning towards it right now.
I like the Mk III. You've got the Cobra, so buying the Viper Mk IV would be picking up a slightly more combat oriented version of the ship you've already got. Why have two multi-role ships that serve similar roles would be my question.
The Viper Mk III has a job, and that job is combat. The Cobra can smuggle and run Rare's. Next you buy a Type-6 and you've got one of everything. Then you can upgrade to more expensive ships.
NOTE: I've flown the above ships, but I have not flown a Viper Mk IV. A passing glance shows it to fill the same role as the Cobra Mk III, albeit slower and more combat inclined. But you already have a Cobra...
Would you really consider the Viper IV a multi-role?
I use the Cobra as an explorer, so right now it's not a multi-role at all, and the Viper IV would be a considerably tougher combat ship - even as a baseline.
I
was ready to just buy the IV, but now I'm not sure... I'll see if there are any good vids showing it in action.
