Ship Builds & Load Outs Meta Alloy Questions and My First Engineered Ship

[ThriveInDark]

Hello CMDRs, I am back after quite a long break (Pre-Horizons I had played about 400 hours), and am back and addicted now on PC. Most of the info I find on meta alloys seems like it is 8 months old, and a lot keep talking about being able to buy them on Darnielle's Progress I think over in Maia? But I don't see them listed as a commodity on the trading tool. Anyway, I would like to engineer my ship and have it be as little grind as possible so if anyone has any current info/tips to get me started I'd appreciate it. Also, here is the build I want to put together for my Imperial Courier. I will be using an A kitted AspX for flying around and collecting etc though.

Courier Build: (80% Combat/20% Multi-role) https://eddp.co/u/WC3Wbett

AspX (in case changing my loadout can make this more efficient):
https://eddp.co/u/LN2BdLkW

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[goemon]

current reports are that meta-alloys are out of ale, i'd fly over there anyway, and if they are not on the market, use this thread to find a ripe barnacle to harvest them yourself: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/312632-Meta-Alloy-Ripe-Barnacle-sources

courier build: you can run it with a smaller powerplant, saving weight -> more speed. in case do a overcharged grade 1 class and reroll till you get a power and heatefficiency increase.
boosters: use d- or e-class booster, less weight, nearby same effect.
i advise against d-class lightweight sensors - range gets really low, and on a speedy ship you need that range. take a-class lightweight.

your AspE is missing a frameshift wake scanner, which you'll need to collect data from wakes. also i found a collector limpet controller helpfull for collecting instead of scooping.

i did the original collecting for engineers in a courier ;-)

 

[ThriveInDark]

current reports are that meta-alloys are out of ale, i'd fly over there anyway, and if they are not on the market, use this thread to find a ripe barnacle to harvest them yourself: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/312632-Meta-Alloy-Ripe-Barnacle-sources

courier build: you can run it with a smaller powerplant, saving weight -> more speed. in case do a overcharged grade 1 class and reroll till you get a power and heatefficiency increase.
boosters: use d- or e-class booster, less weight, nearby same effect.
i advise against d-class lightweight sensors - range gets really low, and on a speedy ship you need that range. take a-class lightweight.

your AspE is missing a frameshift wake scanner, which you'll need to collect data from wakes. also i found a collector limpet controller helpfull for collecting instead of scooping.

i did the original collecting for engineers in a courier ;-)

Now THAT my friend is nuts, although if I am being honest, the Courier is probably my favorite ship in the game, and I've had everything but the Cutter/Corvette. Then again, that was all Pre-Horizons, and the FDL got a buff, so some things may be different. I got ED for PC Friday, I am up to 85 mil already, and having my networth transferred so about 550-600ish mil on the way. Should allow me to get through the rank up/collection grind efficiently. Any generalized ship tips for farming materials etc? What's the next step after AspE? Python? I didn't know wake scanners were important for this, thanks for the tip there. I don't really know anything about data, everything I have seen talks about commodities and meta alloy.......

Your and Ceekay's Courier builds on another thread are what I based my choices for this first build on. I was shooting for upwards of 600 m/s, I took the 4a powerplant because with the 3a overdrive I'd need to do more power management unless basically a perfect roll according to eddb, and since I was still over 600 I rolled with the 4a. I can't believe the engineered builds you guys have managed to put together. Seems like this is gonna take quite a while even with funding.

By changing the boosters/power plant I did pick up 30 m/s without power management and still 360 MJ shields... https://eddp.co/u/bURfpj3P

 

[Jon flint]

You can now also reliably get meta alloys from the new alien sites like HIP 14909 (planet 2a, -28/-27). A good alternative source to barnacles.

 

[ThriveInDark]

Excellent, good to know. Can you shed any light on the data thing? Do they not use commodities anymore? I'm kind of lost. Like how would you get a hull full of enough materials to upgrade small ships if you can't store a ship with cargo in its hold?

 

[ThriveInDark]

You can now also reliably get meta alloys from the new alien sites like HIP 14909 (planet 2a, -28/-27). A good alternative source to barnacles.

Hmm, ok so I am on planet 2a, -28/-27, and have cruised around the area a bit, I don't see anything.....

Actually, I found a giant alien pit at -26/-27 so I figure thats it. There is nothing here to grab or shootn'n'loot so far though

 

[Ceekay]

Excellent, good to know. Can you shed any light on the data thing? Do they not use commodities anymore? I'm kind of lost. Like how would you get a hull full of enough materials to upgrade small ships if you can't store a ship with cargo in its hold?

Engineering commodities are currently suspended until suitable storage is available, so make the most of it!

Hmm, ok so I am on planet 2a, -28/-27, and have cruised around the area a bit, I don't see anything.....

Actually, I found a giant alien pit at -26/-27 so I figure thats it. There is nothing here to grab or shootn'n'loot so far though

If you're after meta alloys you'll have to get in the SRV and shoot a "ripe" barnacle they have a glow around the pod https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&r...hCg0N8rY19nsLnY6plmpG9Dw&ust=1499410211581324 the pod should be meta alloy so scoop and transfer to your ship.

The barnacles also drop engineering mats so it's worth collecting them too if they're rare, relog a few times and build up your mat stock.

The wake scanner is for Datamined Wake Exceptions as you'll need them for G5 increased FSD range, the best source is distribution centres in famine systems park about 2 - 3 km from the T9's and scan the small ships wakes as they jump out

Increased FSD range blueprint

http://en.ed-board.net/?m=engineer.modification&n=fsd-increased-fsd-range

http://en.ed-board.net/

https://inara.cz/galaxy-engineers

 

[goemon]

What's the next step after AspE? Python? ... I can't believe the engineered builds you guys have managed to put together. Seems like this is gonna take quite a while even with funding.

- you rarely need anything more than an AspE; i have done most material farming in a courier and DBE - with an occasional mining clipper. of course, python will do it all, like always.

- engineering gets faster over time, especially if you engineer the same module type more than once. for exampel i farmed everything for a FSD 5 range increase, and had a bunch of FSDs transferred to farseer, and engineered 5-10 at once. you end up with a better FSD for all your ships. if you have several ships using the same FSD class (FSD 5: AspE, Python, Clipper...) you use the best roll for the ship you think needs FSD range most, etc. some material are bottlenecks for a blueprint, i always aimed for having 10-20 of them in my inventory. some of my favourite engineered ships are build from spare parts of other ships... for exampel my combat eagle is thrown together of modules orginally engineered for my courier, but being "bad rolls".

 

[Ceekay]

Some good advice from goemon (as usual! ), actually unlocking some of the engineers can take a chunk of time for example Palin you need an invite from Qwent (lvl 3 + Martuuk), then access to Sirius, and then 25 modular terminals to unlock and then rank to lvl 3+, and then 5000 LY from start before you get an invite from Palin and then 25 unknow fragments to unlock phew!!!!!!!!!

The mats/data bit is easy and fairly quick in comparison, it might be worth keeping your exploration data and selling it to a Sirius faction as that'll help towards getting allied with Sirius and unlocking the permit to access Qwent

 

[ThriveInDark]

Some good advice from goemon (as usual! ), actually unlocking some of the engineers can take a chunk of time for example Palin you need an invite from Qwent (lvl 3 + Martuuk), then access to Sirius, and then 25 modular terminals to unlock and then rank to lvl 3+, and then 5000 LY from start before you get an invite from Palin and then 25 unknow fragments to unlock phew!!!!!!!!!

The mats/data bit is easy and fairly quick in comparison, it might be worth keeping your exploration data and selling it to a Sirius faction as that'll help towards getting allied with Sirius and unlocking the permit to access Qwent

I know you aren't trying to discourage me, but I feel like this is a demotivational meme in the works...... This game is incredible, I sort of question whether I have the available hours a week to bother getting into this stuff lol. I mean yeah, I'd get it all done eventually but I'd be spending all my game hours hopping and collecting for weeks at least, months more likely.

Thanks for the excellent info though, I really had some key points about it confused.

Too bad players can't sell modules to other players, which would be cool. Sell the ones you don't need for however much you want to ask/can get, people who want to focus on things like trading and combat that only really reward credits can buy their respective competitive edge. And anyone who already slogged the grind is already set up to take advantage of it, so nothing for them to be mad about. Le sigh, I'm gonna go bounty hunt and ponder this engineering rabbit hole.

But really, if it was possible what would you guys think of it? I'd easily pay 100 mil for a pretty decently rolled combat Courier.....

 

[Ceekay]

Apologies I know the number of hoops can seem daunting all I was trying to show was that the a little planning can reduce the grind significantly, although the Palin hoop train is a bit of a pain the rest are reasonably straightforward.

You can get an excellent Courier with access to Farseer, the Dweller, Lee Cheung, Didi Vatermann and Selene Jean in fact if the shields, boosters and armour are fine as stock just Farseer and the Dweller are needed, here's a combat Courier build with just those two engineers upgrades it's fast has decent range and will be a capable fighter.

https://coriolis.edcd.io/outfit/imp...YbAI0QAAAA==.EweloBhAWEA4QFMCGBzANokICMF9A===

As module storage is limited to 60 I've read of several commanders who use Anacondas and Cutters to store excess modules, I've built several Cobra 3's and Viper 3's to store smaller modules and I'm still around 55 modules simply because each modified module represents a significant amount of time and effort I hate selling them.

Although I've no real issue with either I can't see module or ship sale happening, it's probably a very difficult area to control and would be open to exploits so FD are unlikely to implement it, perhaps selling your excess modules to engineers for resale might be the way forward or if we get base ownership at some point you can sell to or from the base outfitting section.

 

[goemon]

just to chime in with ceekay.

i have three accounts now.

my main account has access to all engineers now. yeah, a lot of time invested.

my secondary account has no engineers. nice challenge in combat!

my third account only uses some of the "basic" engineers: farseer, martuuk, the dweller. you can build an impressive courier just using those. farseer for thrusters up to grade 3, martuuk for shields up grade 3, the dweller for powerdistributor, and some g1 armour, powerplant and thruster mods. if you like, you can run a whole MC courier, using the fourth basic engineer todd.

 

[Ceekay]

goemon obviously has too much time and money (don't mind me I'm just jealous ), I do have a totally un-engineered Eagle that I use as a "soft restart" (stock Eagle and 2000 credits) and it works fine, I've had a few rebuys due to being overambitious but that's probably down to me usually flying heavily engineered ships but with some care and common sense the game is quite playable with stock ships and parts.

 

[ThriveInDark]

goemon obviously has too much time and money (don't mind me I'm just jealous ), I do have a totally un-engineered Eagle that I use as a "soft restart" (stock Eagle and 2000 credits) and it works fine, I've had a few rebuys due to being overambitious but that's probably down to me usually flying heavily engineered ships but with some care and common sense the game is quite playable with stock ships and parts.

Yeah the game is totally playable regardless, but I'm a motorcycle mechanic and woodworker in real life. So like, I always want to tinker as deep as I can, but honestly with a full time job and personal projects limiting my play time, when I do log in the last thing I want to do is a lot of fetch and go to unlock access to something, its just a shame is all because I'd have a lot of fun with it. Sometimes I just feel like I spend all my time working on getting access to things, whether ships, creds, mods, materials, etc, and its like doing a ton of chores without ever going out on Saturday night.... I'll take a look at some of the more middle ground builds and start there most likely.

If it was something I could grind out in a couple weekends of 2x 8 hour play sessions or something I could hammer it out like that, but it sounds like it would be much more than that.

 

[Ceekay]

If you just concentrate on the core engineers Farseer, the Dweller and Tod McQuinn you'll have engineer access to core components (some to lvl5) and most weapon types and I reckon with a bit of planning you could sort that in a long weekend.

Stock shields, boosters armour are good enough without mods for PVE just use A grade shields and more boosters and fit military armour, TBH for me engineering allows me to have relatively low cost ship builds with better performance the A grade using C and D grade components, for example here's my current multi-role Python without engineering it'd get chewed up by mid level Condas but it's capable of taking on Elite Condas one on one with minimal damage.

https://coriolis.edcd.io/outfit/pyt...AZgXICyYn5F0jGtmSKAgAA&bn=Python ERC-E (EDMC)

On my Python I use a 6C thruster with G5 DDT but a 6A thruster with G3 DDT will give almost identical speed and agility with a little additional power draw and much higher cost.

In fact some G3 DDT rolls will exceed the stated +20% max (I've several at 23%) so collect plenty of mats/data and roll many times and you'll have an excellent performance boost with easily attainable mats/data.

Even with recent update cracked industrial firmware (CIF) and exquisite focus crystals (EFC) aren't easy to get hold of, a couple of updates back they were non existent so some of my ships still have G3 DDT or G5 CDT thruster mods, so I wouldn't worry too much about Palin in the short term as although the performance boost is worthwhile mats/data availability is always going to be limited.