Ships Ships ranked by S hardpoint equivalents

[bruce1337]

For no particular reason other than being somewhat interesting to me, I compiled this ranking of ships by "S hardpoint equivalents" as an estimate of firepower. As you may or may not know, hardpoints gain ~50% damage per class size increase, thus 1 H = 3/2 L = (3/2)² M = (3/2)³ S or inversely 1 S = 2/3 M = (2/3)² L = (2/3)³ H.

IOW, these numbers represent H * 27/8 + L * 9/4 + M * 3/2 + S (with the applicable amount of HPs inserted into their respective size moniker) to yield said S hardpoint equivalents.

Yes, this ignores PP/PD constraints and hardness considerations entirely, but given the ubiquity of rails, plasmas, corrosion, charge enhanced PDs and overcharged PPs, these don't seem to matter nearly as much as they used to, anyway...

So without further ado – hope you'll too find this interesting:

(Added power plant and power distributor classes of ships in square brackets, i.e. [3,2] = 3 PP, 2 PD)

Type-10 [8,7]	15.5
Anaconda [8,8]	15.125
Corvette [8,8]	14
Cutter [8,7]	13.875
FGS [6,7]	10.25
Mamba [6,6]	9.875
Challenger [6,6], Krait Mk2 [7,7] , Python [7,7]	9.75
FDL [6,6]	9.375
Chieftain [6,6]	9
Crusader [6,6], FDS [6,6]	8.25
Beluga [6,6], Clipper [6,6], FAS [6,6], Phantom [7,7]	7.5
Asp Ex [5,4]	7
Cobra Mk4 [4,3]	6
DBX [4,4], Orca [5,5]	5.25
Cobra Mk3 [4,3], DBS [4,3], Keelback [4,3], Viper Mk4 [4,3], Viper Mk3 [3,3]	5
Courier [4,3], Vulture [4,5]	4.5
Adder [3,2], Imp. Eagle [3,2]	3.5
Eagle [2,2]	3
Dolphin [4,3], Sidewinder [2,1]	2
Hauler [2,1]	1

 

[Three Stars]

Very interesting.

One of my favorite things about the Chieftain is that you can put cytoscramblers on the small hardpoints and basically turn them into large hardpoint equivalents damage wise…at least when shields are up.

I’d love an FDL with the Mamba’s hardpoint arrangement.

Another factor that’s difficult to account for is hardpoint placement. Not every gun can hit at once on several of those ships, unless your target is gracious enough to sit still dead ahead for you.

 

[bruce1337]

True, and if the target was gracious enough, fixed Ls on a T-10 would still miss, unless shooting another T-10. Yes, Cytos are OP – is that why you'd prefer a 1H2L2S FDL?

What I found most surprising was the near parity of Corvette & Cutter, as well as the Conda's superiority to both – goes to show that it isn't all about the huge hardpoints. Also that the 2M2S ships surpass the Vulture, although their 3PDs have nothing on its 5PD in terms of sustain.

I'd like to see some more variants in the small tier of ships. 1L2S, 1L1M1S, 1L2M or even something like 1H2S. Possibly 1M3S for the Cyto afficionados?

 

[cmdr Ramius007]

2M2S is even stronger if we consider things like advanced missile rack, enforcers and cytos, even just seeker missiles are better on small hp thx to synth. Vulture is more or less forced to use pacifiers to come on top of dmg, but versatility suffer

 

[Three Stars]

I prefer to have two sets of high AP weapons (1H and 2L) along with two utility slots for corrosive or whatever. With the FDL’s mediums I feel like I’m leaving damage on the table trying to mix utility and damage, and the mediums don’t punch hard enough individually. I also prefer dorsal hardpoints over ventral.

That’s another calculation you could do: The ratio of small hardpoint equivalents to PD size. As with your numbers above there would be a fair bit of YMMV involved, but for each PD size you’d have ships like the Phantom that could go crazy with PD draw comparing with ships like the type 10 that have lots of mouths to feed.

 

[bruce1337]

I prefer to have two sets of high AP weapons (1H and 2L) along with two utility slots for corrosive or whatever. With the FDL’s mediums I feel like I’m leaving damage on the table trying to mix utility and damage, and the mediums don’t punch hard enough individually. I also prefer dorsal hardpoints over ventral.

You can get all of that in a Mamba, but lose 1/3 of pitch/s, yet as far as PAs and rails are concerned, the punch of mediums is perfectly fine. Fixed weapons on its 2 Ls can only hit broadsides, though, so you're almost being forced into some kind of asymmetric setup. If you had a 1H2L2S FDL, rails would almost certainly be downgraded to S, while I wish I could mount M rails on a Mamba – somewhere else than on the H & L points, quite needless to say...

That’s another calculation you could do: The ratio of small hardpoint equivalents to PD size. As with your numbers above there would be a fair bit of YMMV involved, but for each PD size you’d have ships like the Phantom that could go crazy with PD draw comparing with ships like the type 10 that have lots of mouths to feed.

I did consider adding PP/PD classes to the ship names, maybe I will...

 

[Trollymctrollerson]

It's interesting to see this perspective. It obviously has caveats like hardpoint placement, power distributor, ship agility and whatever else in terms of actually delivering damage to a moving target. Nonetheless I'm pleased to see the FGS ranked as the most powerful medium ship in terms of firepower. It's obviously far from the top in many other categories but in my opinion it deserves to outgun all other medium ships given its drawbacks.

 

[Darkman Returns]

And then there is the impact of Ship Launched Fighters for those ships capable of carrying them. They're basically 2 very mobile, auto-tracking Large hardpoints.

A Gelid F GU-97 Imperial Fighter for example has 2 Beam Lasers with a combined DPS of 45; more than 2 Large Long Range / Thermal Vent Gimballed Beam Lasers (40.6), or nearly as much as 2 Efficient / TV ones (50.34) within 600m.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/58q7cv/everything_you_need_to_know_about_ship_launched/
https://edsy.org[

 

[bruce1337]

Kinda worth mentioning that while +50% dmg / class size does apply for pulse lasers, other weapon types exhibit wonkier scaling. Frags and MCs gain ~100% from S to M, then ~50% from M to L, beams and bursts gain ~55-60% / class, rails gain 78% from S to M (SDPS), and PAs 40% and 35% to L and H, respectively, albeit heat / damage decreases on the Hs.

So yeah, grains of salt to be taken liberally.

 

[Three Stars]

Even more grains of salt: Multicannons have spin-up with the exception of the huge.

Someone in my squadron #didthemath for beams, bursts and multicannons. The damage distribution is interesting (edit) although a bit misleading. Having more sMC damage equivalents doesn’t mean more DPS.

 

[bruce1337]

Beams scale rather well and linearly (with a factor peculiarly close to ф), but so does their distributor load. MCs scale rather non-linearly (1.8 / 1.5 / 1.22), but the H has no spin-up – and MCs are very easy on distributors. S & M spin-up time is relatively negligible, making the M appear to occupy a sweet spot (aside from penetration values...).

I have several builds which employ the Ls spin-up time in fire group logics, though: feather trigger for no daka and hold for daka daka, so there's that.

 

[Three Stars]

There’s your next project. Scale the weapon penetration values and combine them somehow with the small damage equivalents for an overall relative damage reference value.

 

[bruce1337]

With shield tanking being the dominant strategy and hulls being corroded or modules sniped, that doesn't seem worthwhile to me, I'm afraid.

 

[Surprize960]

It's an interesting theoretical consideration and I really don't want to badmouth it. But the facts are that in actual combat, the Corvette does by far the most damage. Except for the Class 3 hardpoint, all of the weapons are mounted on the upper side and enemies tend to fly over you when they fly their attackrun. With gimballed weapons, you can do much more damage to them in close combat than the Anaconda ever could.

In addition, the lower class 3 is also more usable than the one on the Conda. And above all, she is much more nimble.

And with turrets on the class 1 and 2 you can fire literally aft.

 

[Three Stars]

It's an interesting theoretical consideration and I really don't want to badmouth it. But the facts are that in actual combat, the Corvette does by far the most damage. Except for the Class 3 hardpoint, all of the weapons are mounted on the upper side and enemies tend to fly over you when they fly their attackrun. With gimballed weapons, you can do much more damage to them in close combat than the Anaconda ever could.

In addition, the lower class 3 is also more usable than the one on the Conda. And above all, she is much more nimble.

And with turrets on the class 1 and 2 you can fire literally aft.

This calculation is a lot more about potential than reality.

I‘m a staunch Corvette guy, but calling its class 3 hardpoint “usable“ only works if you attach the word “barely” to the front of it. It’s isolated from all of the other hardpoints on the bottom of the ship. It only converges with the others at a distance and has real trouble with close up ships, especially if you’re trying to target with the huge hardpoints simultaneously. The Anaconda’s ventral large is mounted more forward (really close to the nose, actually) than the one on the Vette, so it has a more useful arc of fire. Plus, it gets the benefit of a huge hardpoint to firegroup together with it.

I’d say that the hardpoints on an Anaconda are better converged overall than the Corvette, and it has a more useful variety of hardpoints overall, which makes its potential damage higher. The Corvette, however, has an easier job of getting its weapons on target with its inherent maneuverability, and you get to use twin huge hardpoints that are beautifully mounted nice and central in your aim to do the vast majority of your damage. The rest of the hardpoints are basically a viper iii glued to the front of the ship and a large hardpoint somewhere near your shoes...so it’s not much.

Not that the Conda is all sweetness and light. The small hardpoints might as well not exist. I also had to strip one down to minimum thruster mass to get it to move the way I like it.

 

[SergMx]

I'm sorry, I don't quite understand the meaning of this table. How and what can it be used for?

 

[Surprize960]

This calculation is a lot more about potential than reality.

I‘m a staunch Corvette guy, but calling its class 3 hardpoint “usable“ only works if you attach the word “barely” to the front of it. It’s isolated from all of the other hardpoints on the bottom of the ship. It only converges with the others at a distance and has real trouble with close up ships, especially if you’re trying to target with the huge hardpoints simultaneously. The Anaconda’s ventral large is mounted more forward (really close to the nose, actually) than the one on the Vette, so it has a more useful arc of fire. Plus, it gets the benefit of a huge hardpoint to firegroup together with it.

I’d say that the hardpoints on an Anaconda are better converged overall than the Corvette, and it has a more useful variety of hardpoints overall, which makes its potential damage higher. The Corvette, however, has an easier job of getting its weapons on target with its inherent maneuverability, and you get to use twin huge hardpoints that are beautifully mounted nice and central in your aim to do the vast majority of your damage. The rest of the hardpoints are basically a viper iii glued to the front of the ship and a large hardpoint somewhere near your shoes...so it’s not much.

Not that the Conda is all sweetness and light. The small hardpoints might as well not exist. I also had to strip one down to minimum thruster mass to get it to move the way I like it.

What is great on the Conda are the two top mounted class 3 and the side mounted class 2. But the Vette has these class 2 also and her 2 class 4 on the upper side. The class 4 on the Conda has also a good convergence, but not as good as the 2 on the Vette, especially in close quarters.

On both the nose-mounted class 3 are not well placed, and the Conda‘s one is far away from the convergence of the class 4. On the Vette you just point your nose a bit up and it fires. Just try it with both and you will notice that it is easier to bring it to bear than the one on the Conda. I use a corrosive MC in both, and with the Vette its easier to score hits.

With overcharged or LR beams the class 1 on the Vette are very useful. As you say, on the Conda they „might as well not exist“.

 

[bruce1337]

I'm sorry, I don't quite understand the meaning of this table. How and what can it be used for?

It's just a theoretical approach to quantify firepower, which can sometimes be obscured by superficial looks at hardpoint setups.

 

[bruce1337]

With overcharged or LR beams the class 1 on the Vette are very useful. As you say, on the Conda they „might as well not exist“.

Railguns strongly disagree.

 

[SergMx]

What is great on the Conda are the two top mounted class 3 and the side mounted class 2. But the Vette has these class 2 also and her 2 class 4 on the upper side. The class 4 on the Conda has also a good convergence, but now as good as the 2 on the Vette, especially in close quarters.

On both the nose-mounted class 3 are not well placed, and the Conda‘s one is far away from the convergence of the class 4. On the Vette you just point your nose a bit up and it fires. Just try it with both and you will notice that it is easier to bring it to bear than the one on the Conda. I use a corrosive MC in both, and with the Vette its easier to score hits.

With overcharged or LR beams the class 1 on the Vette are very useful. As you say, on the Conda they „might as well not exist“.

It's not. It's just that the Corvette is much more maneuverable than the Anaconda.