Meet the Mandaslay, adept at exploration and combat.
Why build for one when you can have both?
Source: https://youtu.be/JI3Tr7gVHXM?si=Yuj3B8VZRee_NAH6
Why build for one when you can have both?
Mandalay - combat or exploration, why not both?
- Thread starter Nugstar
- Start date
Interesting build. For similar functionality I usually go with a bit different approach.
As a base to start with - 54.63 / 58.25 LY, 456 / 570 Boost, 609 Fast Charge Bi-Wave, 2,539 Hull, MRP 94% / 330, Armored PP, 6A FS
For a more universal build - 55.31 / 59.03 LY, 457 / 571 Boost, 505 Fast Charge Bi-Wave, Point Defense, 1,914 Hull, MRP 84% / 225, Armored PP, 6A FS, SRV, 16 T Cargo. Frags could be switched for MCs if that is more up your alley.
If Cargo Rack is switched for FSD Booster - 64.39 / 68.09 LY. Class 1 MRP can be switched for AFMU, then MRP 60% / 155. If Guardian Plasma is not your cup of tea, then, including other changes - (64.37 / 68.06 LY) Rails + Concords make full use of med HPs even those on the wings always, in case of a chaff burst of 3 with 1300 m/s speed makes landing shots without a target lock easier.
Shields won't protect you from mindlessly nose-diving into a high-g planet, but with all utility of PD/ECM, Chaff and Heat-sinks, protected PP & FSD, good hull and fast shields, plus extra speed and maneuverability - lots of options and plays to get out of any situation.
Also, without any changes to core internals except low emission PP, and with minimal changes to optional, it can be used for AX-combat (traveling build), DSS can be switched for AMFU. Or - Titan bombing - if it would ever come back.
Love the ship, and this core build approach, as it allows to adapt it to any function I could ever want from it with minimal changes while providing the best performance in strongest abilities Mandalay has.
As a base to start with - 54.63 / 58.25 LY, 456 / 570 Boost, 609 Fast Charge Bi-Wave, 2,539 Hull, MRP 94% / 330, Armored PP, 6A FS
For a more universal build - 55.31 / 59.03 LY, 457 / 571 Boost, 505 Fast Charge Bi-Wave, Point Defense, 1,914 Hull, MRP 84% / 225, Armored PP, 6A FS, SRV, 16 T Cargo. Frags could be switched for MCs if that is more up your alley.
If Cargo Rack is switched for FSD Booster - 64.39 / 68.09 LY. Class 1 MRP can be switched for AFMU, then MRP 60% / 155. If Guardian Plasma is not your cup of tea, then, including other changes - (64.37 / 68.06 LY) Rails + Concords make full use of med HPs even those on the wings always, in case of a chaff burst of 3 with 1300 m/s speed makes landing shots without a target lock easier.
Shields won't protect you from mindlessly nose-diving into a high-g planet, but with all utility of PD/ECM, Chaff and Heat-sinks, protected PP & FSD, good hull and fast shields, plus extra speed and maneuverability - lots of options and plays to get out of any situation.
Also, without any changes to core internals except low emission PP, and with minimal changes to optional, it can be used for AX-combat (traveling build), DSS can be switched for AMFU. Or - Titan bombing - if it would ever come back.
Love the ship, and this core build approach, as it allows to adapt it to any function I could ever want from it with minimal changes while providing the best performance in strongest abilities Mandalay has.
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My "daily driver" ship used to be a Krait Phantom which, itself, started off as an "exploration" build and then got modified into more of a light-weight multirole.
It was never as tough or as fighty as my "proper" multirole ships, much less my combat ships, but it could hold it's own in RES's and against pirates etc.
Knew I wanted a Mandalay as soon as I saw it but, once I saw the spec's, I wondered if it'd be able to match the Phantom and give me greater jump-range.
Turned out to be way less of an issue than I thought.
Basically, although the Phantom has some bigger slots, it needs to have things like FSD boosters and shield boosters in some of those slots to give it the capability I wanted.
Beyond that, I just cut/pasted a lot of the modules from one ship to the other and the result was better than I expected.
Daily Driver Phantom: https://s.orbis.zone/qMvb
Daily Driver Mandalay: https://s.orbis.zone/qMvc
Now I just wish FDev would release some decent red paintjobs for the Mandy' cos Serana needs a red outfit!
It was never as tough or as fighty as my "proper" multirole ships, much less my combat ships, but it could hold it's own in RES's and against pirates etc.
Knew I wanted a Mandalay as soon as I saw it but, once I saw the spec's, I wondered if it'd be able to match the Phantom and give me greater jump-range.
Turned out to be way less of an issue than I thought.
Basically, although the Phantom has some bigger slots, it needs to have things like FSD boosters and shield boosters in some of those slots to give it the capability I wanted.
Beyond that, I just cut/pasted a lot of the modules from one ship to the other and the result was better than I expected.
Daily Driver Phantom: https://s.orbis.zone/qMvb
Daily Driver Mandalay: https://s.orbis.zone/qMvc
Now I just wish FDev would release some decent red paintjobs for the Mandy' cos Serana needs a red outfit!
Now I just wish FDev would release some decent red paintjobs for the Mandy' cos Serana needs a red outfit!
Definitely!
Some nice ideas there cmdr, thanks.
MandaSlay is really good, I almost changed the name of my ship
I do wonder if for a bubble based build it's worth forgoing the fuel scoop to give an extra option with the larger slots. A total range of over 300 ly is pretty much one end to the other.
Fair comment.
I often just bung a 2A or 3A scoop in my multirole ships.
They shouldn't really need to scoop fuel routinely but there's always the chance that something bad will happen when the tank's nearly empty and I'll be forced to jump away.
In that case, even if I have to hang around a star for a couple of minutes to refuel, a small scoop will allow me to get home.
Yeah, I wouldn't disagree with having a small scoop in there just in case, but a class 6 slot has a lot of options if you're leaning towards wanting a mote multipurpose build.
My "daily driver" ship used to be a Krait Phantom which, itself, started off as an "exploration" build and then got modified into more of a light-weight multirole.
It was never as tough or as fighty as my "proper" multirole ships, much less my combat ships, but it could hold it's own in RES's and against pirates etc.
Knew I wanted a Mandalay as soon as I saw it but, once I saw the spec's, I wondered if it'd be able to match the Phantom and give me greater jump-range.
Turned out to be way less of an issue than I thought.
Basically, although the Phantom has some bigger slots, it needs to have things like FSD boosters and shield boosters in some of those slots to give it the capability I wanted.
Beyond that, I just cut/pasted a lot of the modules from one ship to the other and the result was better than I expected.
Daily Driver Phantom: https://s.orbis.zone/qMvb
Daily Driver Mandalay: https://s.orbis.zone/qMvc
Now I just wish FDev would release some decent red paintjobs for the Mandy' cos Serana needs a red outfit!
I wanted this ship to be able to go exploring without any limitations, whilst also being able to do some of the toughest pve combat in the game. This.means most of my internals are utility's for exploring, and that doesn't leave room for much hull.
For tougher combat like the wing assassination missions, spec ops or pirate threat activity signal sources you're going to need a very good shield. I'm not convinced a bi-weave would cope well, and the limited hull won't keep me alive for long.
My Mandalay is great at both. Flying around scanning daisies and to rain pain, death and destruction upon anything that gets in my way.
s.orbis.zone
Coriolis EDCD Edition
A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous
s.orbis.zone
I don't have the Mandalay yet (just waiting for it to be available for credits) but many of my ships including my T-8 have small(er) scoops for Bubble travel. Simply extending the total jump range is good insurance for one. And for another, even the smallest scoop lets my heavier freighters fsd boost using white dwarfs. There's a corner of the bubble that has a rich network of them for some reason.
Depends on what you intend to do with a ship, we all do things differently of course. I tend to stay within 50ly of where I've dumped my carrier (and I'm always within 500ly of it in case of a real emergency), so anything with a range of over 200 ly means I'll never actually need to scoop fuel. It's not been a problem yet, even with SCO, but I absolutely understand people looking at that and calling it madness because from their point of view, why would you not even have a 1A scoop and eliminate a rebuy risk.
I dunno.
I have "rules" for my builds (which saves me from constantly changing my mind about what works best) and I simply always fit bi-weaves to my combat ships, for the regen rate.
If a shield isn't tough enough, it means I need a bigger bi-weave, more boosters or a different ship.
Ultimately, I've never encountered a mission where my Corvette, with 4,500mj of bi-weave, was in jeopardy.
I'm not really a fan of big "one and done" shields but if I was building a ship dedicated to assassination missions - where you take out ONE target and then head back to a station - that'd be one of the times where a honking great prismatic shield would probably be a good choice.
I suppose one option might be to normally fit, say, a bi-weave and a smaller PP to a ship and then have a bigger PP and big prismatic shield in storage to fit when required but, honestly, in that case I'd just build a whole other ship instead, cos I just don't like swapping and changing modules.
500mj shields and 1k hull. I doubt you'll be raining pain on a wing assassination mission cmdr.My Mandalay is great at both. Flying around scanning daisies and to rain pain, death and destruction upon anything that gets in my way.
Coriolis EDCD Edition
A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous
This build would be ok for haz rez and such like. For most cmdrs who fly solo this would be fine for anything but soloing wing assassination missions or a dangerous/elite conda/corvette (depending on a cmdrs skill level)
Not quite paper thin, but def a build I would class as a "solo only build"...not to say you couldn't fly in open and do combat CGs etc...but I wouldn't risk it personally.
I get that there is a huge variation in ship builds, but why oh why would you want to have a hybrid explorer and combat ship? I don't get it. From where I'm sitting it looks very much like the ship builds posted here are sub optimal for both scenarios. Just because you can, doesn't mean you should
I don't do missions CMDR.
I tried to see how strong I could make the Mandalay if I just went all-out with the goal of making it as much of a tank as possible, capable of soaking up enormous amounts of damage. I got these stats out of it. I'm not really a combat ship expert, so I don't know if these are good or mediocre:
They are good
Wonder how well it handles, not built a full on mandalay combat build yet.
I haven't tried it in practice but in theory those speed, boost, frequency, pitch, roll and yaw numbers should give a picture of how it handles. Although of course raw numbers will never replace practical testing, but anyway.They are good
Wonder how well it handles, not built a full on mandalay combat build yet.