Ship Builds & Load Outs Ships The Last Four Ships (FDL, Mamba, Challenger, and Federal Gunship)

[OmegaPaladin]

I have the pleasure of owning every single ship in Elite Dangerous, but I do not have loadouts for four ships: The Mamba, the Fer-de-Lance, the Alliance Crusader, and the Federal Gunship. I wanted to see if some of you had suggestions for builds. I've found that I've kind defaulted into beam lasers and multi-cannons for my combat designs. My Federal Corvette is a monster with that set up, but I wanted to see if I can do something a bit different.

For the FDL or Mamba, I'm thinking of using them in conflict zones or other high end PVE content. (I could park them near my faction's HQ for BGS warfare) I'm not into PVP. If there is another good use for them, please suggest it. (All-beam boat for spending hours in a HazRes?)

For the Gunship and Crusader, I'm hoping to use them in RES sites with friends on fighters. I'm open to more unusual builds, like cannons, Guardian weapons, or packhound missile spam. I'm open to suggestions, as I have all the engineers and guardian BPs unlocked.

 

[Bigmaec]

Challenger or Crusader? Because the Crusader is the one with the fighter bay.

FdL PvE build ussually uses 4 efficient beams and a corrosive huge Multicannon.
Biweave and some boosters, either dual HRPs or dual SCBs in the c4 slots.

Mamba I use a zoom and boom build with a long range thermal vent fixed beam and quad
Frag cannons.

 

[GroG79]

Dakka gunship.. Just slap on those Multicannons and make the tree light up

 

[OmegaPaladin]

Challenger or Crusader? Because the Crusader is the one with the fighter bay.

FdL PvE build ussually uses 4 efficient beams and a corrosive huge Multicannon.
Biweave and some boosters, either dual HRPs or dual SCBs in the c4 slots.

Mamba I use a zoom and boom build with a long range thermal vent fixed beam and quad
Frag cannons.

The Crusader, yeah. The Challenger I have partly built for AX work using an AXI build.

 

[Three Stars]

Crusaders are nice for ground CZs with friends. You have to fly the ship, but you can give you friends the option of a SLF in the sky or fighting on the ground.

 

[Trollymctrollerson]

The gunship has that class 7 distributor so I like to stuff it full of plasmas. I personally like a build with 4 medium plasma, a large corrosive MC and something nasty in the smalls. I have tried cytos, seekers and rail guns but enforcers are a good option too if you go with a fixed C3 MC. I tried the all MC build and it definitely works but I kind of think that it doesn't fully utilize the power distributor and the C1 MC are kinda useless. FDL, I like a pair of gimbal bursts and huge cannon and 2 plasma. For maximum shield tanking, you can run 4 medium MC and a class 4 cannon. Saves power for engine and shield. Mamba and crusader I haven't used alot.

 

[sinisalo]

I I wanted to see if some of you had suggestions for builds. I've found that I've kind defaulted into beam lasers and multi-cannons for my combat designs.

Here's my FDL, and I do not own any of the other three ships in your list. Beams and multicannons. I sometimes swap out the GFSDB for another HRP if it's a particularly difficult spot, such as pirate threats. Good speed, decent jump, lightweight. I use it for assassinations mostly. Sometimes I'll swap out two small HRPs for a class 1 collector and smal cargo rack for a couple limpets. High-level assassination targets tend to drop good mats.

Eagle Weslake

Th huge multicannon is a unique weapon. It's not a rotating gatling-gun sort of arrangement. One of Elite's most glaring limitations in my view is the fact we can only have two firegroups. The huge MC with no spin up makes me feel almost like I have three firegroups. By putting it on the same firegroup as the medium MCs, I can use the huge MC selectively with quick trigger pulls. Each pull spits out a single corrosive shell. If I want to add the outboard autoloaders I just hold the trigger down a little longer so they complete their spin-up.

This in effect creates a dual-stage trigger, allowing me to apply corrosive as needed, while being selective with autoloader ammunition expenditure. So for example you're giving the good news to a ship that's down to it's last few points of hull and you're holding the beams on him to save MC ammo. A quick pull of the trigger spits out that corrosive shell to boost the beam damage.

Two medium beams isn't quite enough shield-stripping power for me, but it does the trick. I could have gone for four medium beams, but I love multicannons and especially autoloaders, which I think are very underrated.