After deciding on a whim to scrap my small ship fleet, I retained only the trusty DBS in which to launch out into the galaxy and let the tides of chaos sweep me from one place to another (well once that final paycheck from Pranav Antal comes my way - dude still owes me 5 million the tight little so and so....).
The Rubber Ducky II (coriolis.io)
As you can see I've stripped the shields and bulked out with hull reinforcements, the idea is to use the agility and stealth aspects the DBS excels in to keep the scorch marks from the hull (and large amounts of chaff no doubt) - as I am aware though, against NPCs silent running is somewhat blightered. This had lead me into keeping my distance and modest usage of chaff (which seems to work quite well), although even without silent running NPCs seem to have some difficulty "locking on" to me. While I would love my limited experience to be definitive, I need to test against all NPC levels - so a suicide dash into a High Intensity Combat Zone might prove it's metal (or my washing abilities - after all I'm not in the position to play ED naked... what with a toddler and two teenage daughters knocking around
)
A rated all internals although it would be possible to downgrade the power plant to a 3A, not 100% sure if that would help with heat management and it won't disable any modules with weapons deployed (and a 2A doesn't have enough juice for my weapon loadout). While I could drop life support if I'm sticking close to stations, there is no way I dropping sensors - having the ability to spot "stealth" players at a slightly greater distance gives me a few precious seconds to prepare myself (and scoot, currently running around the universe in a chicken outfit).
Twin chaff and twin heat sink launchers - I always like to run double chaff on combat craft where possible, kind of acts like an additional shield at times. The heat sink launchers are something I tend to start using properly (as is the rest of the DBS's stealth characteristics) but this is an area that might or might not be benefited with something else for now.
Right, going on shout abuse at my choice of gimbals... look I can barely hit targets with gimbals let alone without so it gives me the ability to at least cause some damage. Multi Cannons are a personal favourite of mine and have shaved my backside many a time.
And now to contradict my excuse for running gimbals - twin C1 Railguns. Why? Well originally I was trying out one of those torpedo stealth builds, but found that against NPCs it didn't work (and was too costly). After spending some time transporting my fleet to one place (then selling them all this morning) I found that I was unable to find C1 gimballed beams. Not wanting a straight 4 x MC loadout I thought I'd keep the rails and give them a go in general combat. Before this morning I would hit twice out of 31 times... now though I seem to be hitting 1 in 3 times. it is a question of lining up and remembering the charge up delay.
So where is the post going? And why bother about stealth if I'm not PvPing?
Well this post is going nowhere fast, but I do intend to move into doing PvP exclusively sometime soon - which is why I want to get used to all the ins and outs of my DBS. I thought by posting my build, then tweaking it over the weeks (or months) other players could have a laugh at my expense and watch an old fool try to keep up with the young'uns... or rather those who are a heck of a lot better at this than me which in no way excludes those that have more grey than anything else.
TL;DR - there is a new target flying around with a big bullseye on it, and it goes by the name of CMDR BlackmailGnone
The Rubber Ducky II (coriolis.io)
As you can see I've stripped the shields and bulked out with hull reinforcements, the idea is to use the agility and stealth aspects the DBS excels in to keep the scorch marks from the hull (and large amounts of chaff no doubt) - as I am aware though, against NPCs silent running is somewhat blightered. This had lead me into keeping my distance and modest usage of chaff (which seems to work quite well), although even without silent running NPCs seem to have some difficulty "locking on" to me. While I would love my limited experience to be definitive, I need to test against all NPC levels - so a suicide dash into a High Intensity Combat Zone might prove it's metal (or my washing abilities - after all I'm not in the position to play ED naked... what with a toddler and two teenage daughters knocking around
)A rated all internals although it would be possible to downgrade the power plant to a 3A, not 100% sure if that would help with heat management and it won't disable any modules with weapons deployed (and a 2A doesn't have enough juice for my weapon loadout). While I could drop life support if I'm sticking close to stations, there is no way I dropping sensors - having the ability to spot "stealth" players at a slightly greater distance gives me a few precious seconds to prepare myself (and scoot, currently running around the universe in a chicken outfit).
Twin chaff and twin heat sink launchers - I always like to run double chaff on combat craft where possible, kind of acts like an additional shield at times. The heat sink launchers are something I tend to start using properly (as is the rest of the DBS's stealth characteristics) but this is an area that might or might not be benefited with something else for now.
Right, going on shout abuse at my choice of gimbals... look I can barely hit targets with gimbals let alone without so it gives me the ability to at least cause some damage. Multi Cannons are a personal favourite of mine and have shaved my backside many a time.
And now to contradict my excuse for running gimbals - twin C1 Railguns. Why? Well originally I was trying out one of those torpedo stealth builds, but found that against NPCs it didn't work (and was too costly). After spending some time transporting my fleet to one place (then selling them all this morning) I found that I was unable to find C1 gimballed beams. Not wanting a straight 4 x MC loadout I thought I'd keep the rails and give them a go in general combat. Before this morning I would hit twice out of 31 times... now though I seem to be hitting 1 in 3 times. it is a question of lining up and remembering the charge up delay.
So where is the post going? And why bother about stealth if I'm not PvPing?
Well this post is going nowhere fast, but I do intend to move into doing PvP exclusively sometime soon - which is why I want to get used to all the ins and outs of my DBS. I thought by posting my build, then tweaking it over the weeks (or months) other players could have a laugh at my expense and watch an old fool try to keep up with the young'uns... or rather those who are a heck of a lot better at this than me which in no way excludes those that have more grey than anything else.
TL;DR - there is a new target flying around with a big bullseye on it, and it goes by the name of CMDR BlackmailGnone