Small ship builds that maximise potentials?

Strangepork

Strangepork
Hello Cmdrs,

I recently jumped off my big ship/horse and have been investigating small ship builds that build on good innate characteristics of those ships.

For example I recently learned The ICourier has reasonably good shields for a ship of its size and manoeuvrability. Mixed with one class 2 gimballed beam and two class 2 rail guns, it is a big ship killer extraordinaire.

I'm interested in more than just combat. Do you have any great builds that make the most of the smaller ships?

Many thanks.
 
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Vardaugas

Vardaugas
I have a Dolphin set up as diamond hunter with mining lances to probe iceteroids from afar and only put a prospector on when I find a LTD fragment. All other ores are on the ignore list. The speed and agility of the Dolphin and the 2km range of the mining lances makes probing a large number of iceteroids possible, even enjoyable. Definitely a different experience to bulk mining.
 

Strangepork

Strangepork
Vardaugas said:
I have a Dolphin set up as diamond hunter with mining lances to probe iceteroids from afar and only put a prospector on when I find a LTD fragment. All other ores are on the ignore list. The speed and agility of the Dolphin and the 2km range of the mining lances makes probing a large number of iceteroids possible, even enjoyable. Definitely a different experience to bulk mining.
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Thanks Vardaugas.

I think this next build is quite widely known.

The DBScout, has good heat properties, with a strong hull, small footprint and better than average hard points for a small ship, making it a great little stealth fighter.
 

Kaocraft

Kaocraft
john willi said:
Thanks Vardaugas.

I think this next build is quite widely known.

The DBScout, has good heat properties, with a strong hull, small footprint and better than average hard points for a small ship, making it a great little stealth fighter.
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Isn't stealth "over" pretty much? My understanding is that silent running has been almost completely eliminated as a viable combat technique. It was always worthless in PvE, but changes were made such that it was way too easy to come out of stealth and took way too long to drop off again, such that it was worthless in PvP as well. Has something changed?

Have you had any success with stealth fighter tactics lately?
 

Kaocraft

Kaocraft
Anyway here's my (also well-known) contribution: iEagle stripped of all non-essential modules, with those High Speed experimental drives, engineered with G5 Dirty Drives and everything else engineered for "lightweight" wherever available, with maybe an engine-focused power distributor.

Head to your favorite canyon run or tunnel-filled CQC-type structure and make up a racetrack for yourself. 800m/s+ Hilarity ensues. Also supposedly works well with Viper 3, though I've not tried it.
 

Strangepork

Strangepork
Thanks Kaocraft, I think you may be right about stealth.

Thanks for the IEagle tip.

I have one called "Goodgrief!" (815m/s), I take her to CG's and perma-interdict people who I have identified as griefing, until they leave or eventually I get bored. :)
 
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NecasekO

N
I've grown quite fond of my combat DBX. Most people use it for exploration or "bubble hopping" in lightweight builds, but I found that thanks to its good thermal characteristics and 4 utility slots it responds very well to engineering.

The DBX can easily use a G5 overcharged power plant and still never overheats. With a reinforced prismatic shield and 4 boosters it has over 600 MJ shield with good resistances. And still has enough power to run different combination of weapons - that large hardpoint is rare among small ships. I swap optional internals as needed, for combat I use 1-2 HRPs and 1 MRP. That makes it a pretty tough ship, and if it gets destroyed the rebuy is below 1 MCr.

And it still jumps around 47 Ly and can travel 300 Ly on a full tank.
 

Cervantes01

Cervantes01
Kaocraft said:
Anyway here's my (also well-known) contribution: iEagle stripped of all non-essential modules, with those High Speed experimental drives, engineered with G5 Dirty Drives and everything else engineered for "lightweight" wherever available, with maybe an engine-focused power distributor.

Head to your favorite canyon run or tunnel-filled CQC-type structure and make up a racetrack for yourself. 800m/s+ Hilarity ensues. Also supposedly works well with Viper 3, though I've not tried it.
Click to expand...

Why FD have not put an official racecourse in the game is beyond me...
 

Mrat13

M
Not really "small" ships, but still at the lower end of the market:

Type 7 is a great cheap bulk passenger ship.
Clipper is a great ship when speed is needed (smuggling, piracy, safe mining).

For actual small ships, the DBX and Asp Explorer have always been great explorers, just overshadowed by the anti gravity Conda.

Oh, and the Vulture is still the most agile ship in the game.
 

Mars Starcruiser

Mars Starcruiser
I’ve come to love packhounds on small ships. The dps is actually quite a alot for its size, comparable to railgun but without cap draw. Alot of heat so not recommended with any high draw weapons but managable if you keep your weapon cap full. Next month I’d like to pair them up with enforcers to see how that works on viper/cobra. Been eye’ing them since they are borderline draw/heat free and on paper they’d actually have nearly as much anti-shield dps as small beams, more so after engineering.
 

Stealthie

Stealthie
Kaocraft said:
Anyway here's my (also well-known) contribution: iEagle stripped of all non-essential modules, with those High Speed experimental drives, engineered with G5 Dirty Drives and everything else engineered for "lightweight" wherever available, with maybe an engine-focused power distributor.

Head to your favorite canyon run or tunnel-filled CQC-type structure and make up a racetrack for yourself. 800m/s+ Hilarity ensues. Also supposedly works well with Viper 3, though I've not tried it.
Click to expand...

Do it to a Viper 3 and you'll achieve >900m/s. ;)


On topic, I'm no expert but I know different ships have different "hidden buffs".
The best way to figure out what's good for what is probably to have a play around, comparing different ships with similar builds, on coriolis.io.

We all know, for example, that the Cobra 3 is one of the fastest ships around. It's faster than a keelback, Asp Scout, Viper 4 etc even though it weighs more and uses the same thrusters.
The iCourier is in a similar position with shields - although that can be sort of explained due to it's low weight.
Similar thing with the Viper 4 and armour.

Try out similar builds based on different ships and you'll notice that some ships are especially suited to certain things.
 

Maka Gucci

Maka Gucci
Hull tank Cobra (or with bi weaves), works really well with reverb cas mines. Similarly the convergence and hp placement on the Viper Mk4 works really well with 2x reverb cas mines and 2x super pen rails.
Tried and tested Dog-fighting Courier build: https://eddp.co/u/oJUKPgsa

Always consider with small builds that you'll need something to deal with 10k+ mj, so you almost always have to carry either a feedback cas rail, reverb cas torps or mines.
 
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