Engineers Ship Advice please....

[D.G.Cerberus]

Would appreciate some advice here having been killed in my 'Conda and now somewhat worried about taking it out again @ 15mcr rebuy a pop.
My activities are pretty much everything but exploring, although with the Felicity Farseer level up, guess I may want to rethink that.
My current ships:
1) Anaconda. Wholly A-Rated except PP which is B. Also includes Huge Beam.
2) FAS. Wholly A-Rated
3) Clipper. Wholly A-Rated - will be keeping
4) Courier. Wholly A-Rated - will be keeping
5) Viper IV. Wholly A-Rated
6) Imperial Eagle. Wholly A-Rated
7) Various levels of Sidewinders dotted around but all with A rated FSDs (They were used for ship to ship ferries)

So the advice.
Do I sell the 'Conda?
Do I then replace the FAS with A Rated FDL or keep both?
If storage is too far out as a release, then do I instead buy an A-Rated Python or make do with the reasonable capacity of the Clipper, albeit with the large pad restriction?

My gut feel is to get hold of an FDL as I have never owned one and spend time brushing up on my combat skills, and fitting a small collector limpet and just an 8t Cargo to give some flexibility in mission availability and engineer commodities collection; use the clipper for the main planetary landing vehicle and for missions with greater cargo; Keep the FAS for.....? (although always liked it)

If so, should I transfer the Huge Beam from the Conda to the FDL? Frankly I found it somewhat underwhelming

None of the above - new strategy?!

 

[Chris Simon]

Take a courier for a spin. Buy her the enhanced thrusters and change A3 shield for A2, put on two boosters, chaff and point defense, two burst lasers and a rack of guided missiles.
You will be surprised. Very, very surprised what that ship is capable of, now.

 

[jgm]

I'm doing fine in my Anaconda. I put pulse turrets in the class 1 and 2 slots, multicannons in the upper class 3 slots and beams in the lower class 3 slot and class 4. That gives me enough firepower to be able to take on most combat without worrying too much.

Make sure you have at least reinforced armour, preferably military grade, and a few hull reinforcement packages. That gives you a lot more time when your shields are down to either run or finish the fight. 4 or 5 shield boosters give you a fair chunk of time before the shields go down.

Get friendly with Lei Cheung and upgrade both shield and shield boosters.

Anaconda is still the best general-purpose ship out there; don't give up on it.

 

[Starender]

if your objective is engineers, an Anac/Python/Cutter might be the best choices out there, if you don't want to fight much then an ASP.

It depends on two things, which ship you want to fly (and how much you would sacrifice personal evolution to keep using it) or if you want to be as effective as possible regarding your objectives (in this case the ships i suggested above).

 

[D.G.Cerberus]

Take a courier for a spin. Buy her the enhanced thrusters and change A3 shield for A2, put on two boosters, chaff and point defense, two burst lasers and a rack of guided missiles.
You will be surprised. Very, very surprised what that ship is capable of, now.

Thanks - as I said, will be keeping my courier - always loved flying it and very much looking forward to doing EXACTLY what you suggest!

 

[D.G.Cerberus]

I'm doing fine in my Anaconda. I put pulse turrets in the class 1 and 2 slots, multicannons in the upper class 3 slots and beams in the lower class 3 slot and class 4. That gives me enough firepower to be able to take on most combat without worrying too much.

Make sure you have at least reinforced armour, preferably military grade, and a few hull reinforcement packages. That gives you a lot more time when your shields are down to either run or finish the fight. 4 or 5 shield boosters give you a fair chunk of time before the shields go down.

Get friendly with Lei Cheung and upgrade both shield and shield boosters.

Anaconda is still the best general-purpose ship out there; don't give up on it.

Hmm - the armour would have helped - never needed it before 2.1 - the Conda that killed me (I took his shields down before he took mine) did it by continually keeping contact with me after the first ram. Couldn't get out!
I do love it for its versatility, jump range (which I was looking to improve) and so on......will give that some more thought.

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if your objective is engineers, an Anac/Python/Cutter might be the best choices out there, if you don't want to fight much then an ASP.

It depends on two things, which ship you want to fly (and how much you would sacrifice personal evolution to keep using it) or if you want to be as effective as possible regarding your objectives (in this case the ships i suggested above).

Well made points. So apart from medium landing pads, which to be fair I haven't missed much since selling my Asp and then Python, looks like my Anaconda worth keeping....

 

[D.G.Cerberus]

On the combat side......FDL purchase or stay with the internally more flexible FAS??

 

[Starender]

i find the FAS very hard to use in long rez hunting now because of the new AI, they are a lot more agile and hits very often so the bad shield is really a huge weakness now, that's why i use the FdL with 16t cargo filled with collectors and 2 collectors.

Even in the FdL the shield melts pretty fast when not positioned correctly (nobody can be all the time).

But the crazy thing is that in beta with a fully modified DB scout with 4 inciendiary MCs i was very effective, so it depends a lot on the weapons also.

 

[Derath]

Don't sell the Conda its the best ship for engineers by a sizeable margin, superb all rounder that still somehow has enormous jump distance and hasn't been gimped

 

[D.G.Cerberus]

i find the FAS very hard to use in long rez hunting now because of the new AI, they are a lot more agile and hits very often so the bad shield is really a huge weakness now, that's why i use the FdL with 16t cargo filled with collectors and 2 collectors.

Even in the FdL the shield melts pretty fast when not positioned correctly (nobody can be all the time).

But the crazy thing is that in beta with a fully modified DB scout with 4 inciendiary MCs i was very effective, so it depends a lot on the weapons also.

Yes, The FAS shields are a weakness. Plus, can't help but feel I should have an FDL at some point in my career - I have had 3 FAS's over time because in 2.0 they were great.....not been too bad so far in 2.1 also.....
So one more thing: would you port the Huge Beam I have on the 'conda to the FDL or is it (the Huge Beam) as bad as I think it is!?

 

[vindicator jones]

I would never get rid of the Conda, she is such an awesome multirole ship. The FAS is a great little ship for res farming, but as some have mentioned its small shields have now become a liability. If your going to go the FDL, be prepared to take some time to learn how to fly it. Its a very common problem with commanders coming from the FAS and Vulture expecting more of the same but with better firepower.. The truth is the FDL takes time to learn how to fly properly, and at first you might hate it. But once you have worked out its quirks it probably is one of the most rewarding ships to fly. Fly it bad, and it will punish you, fly it how it wants to be flown and she will reward you in ways you cant imagine.

If your going to go the FDL, have a look at some of my videos specifically on the FDL, it might give you some good pointers.. Some of it is a bit old though as this was previous to the powerplant upgrade. I will be doing an updated version in the coming month or so.

https://www.youtube.com/c/VindicatorJones

 

[D.G.Cerberus]

Don't sell the Conda its the best ship for engineers by a sizeable margin, superb all rounder that still somehow has enormous jump distance and hasn't been gimped

OK then - so to help finance the FDL (assuming you think I should get one.....) do I sell the FAS/ CLipper/ iEagle/ Viper?

 

[Starender]

Yes, The FAS shields are a weakness. Plus, can't help but feel I should have an FDL at some point in my career - I have had 3 FAS's over time because in 2.0 they were great.....not been too bad so far in 2.1 also.....
So one more thing: would you port the Huge Beam I have on the 'conda to the FDL or is it (the Huge Beam) as bad as I think it is!?

The most reliable weapons on the FdL are clearly Huge MCs + 4 pulses, if you want to use your mediums hardpoint for non laser weapons (cannon, rails or missiles) then i suggest to put a huge beam instead.

If you want to nuke modules against big ships then the huge plasma acc is good (require a lot of skill, very punishable if you miss), but overhaul i find the Gimba MC far better dps/dpe/reliable wise.

I'm talking only for pve of course.

 

[D.G.Cerberus]

I would never get rid of the Conda, she is such an awesome multirole ship. The FAS is a great little ship for res farming, but as some have mentioned its small shields have now become a liability. If your going to go the FDL, be prepared to take some time to learn how to fly it. Its a very common problem with commanders coming from the FAS and Vulture expecting more of the same but with better firepower.. The truth is the FDL takes time to learn how to fly properly, and at first you might hate it. But once you have worked out its quirks it probably is one of the most rewarding ships to fly. Fly it bad, and it will punish you, fly it how it wants to be flown and she will reward you in ways you cant imagine.

If your going to go the FDL, have a look at some of my videos specifically on the FDL, it might give you some good pointers.. Some of it is a bit old though as this was previous to the powerplant upgrade. I will be doing an updated version in the coming month or so.

https://www.youtube.com/c/VindicatorJones

Many thanks for the helpful advice....and trust me....as a subscriber I've watched all of them!

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The most reliable weapons on the FdL are clearly Huge MCs + 4 pulses, if you want to use your mediums hardpoint for non laser weapons (cannon, rails or missiles) then i suggest to put a huge beam instead.

If you want to nuke modules against big ships then the huge plasma acc is good (require a lot of skill, very punishable if you miss), but overhaul i find the Gimba MC far better dps/dpe/reliable wise.

I'm talking only for pve of course.

That raises another point. I am about to take my first steps out of solo/ private groups into Open........