Ships The Viper MKIV Owners Club.

[MrScar]

Is it just me or is something about the maneuverability messed up lately? Like, I can barely stop the thrusters from moving me all beyond where I intended to be. And having a lot of slalom aproaches when aiming for landing pads.
I still love the Viper 4, but it seems like we are having a hard time the last couple of days.

Hmmm, what control setup do you run? I use a thrustmaster 16000m fcs HOTAS. I have a small stick on the throttle for thrusters. It does feel a bit drifty but i know how to correct it, so that i have smooth approaches.

Truth is, as a returning Player i have not noticed a difference that something is off. Maybe because i fly helicopters in DCS, where the need for correcting for the drift is something that needs to be done most of the time. But on the other hand, the SRV controls feel a bit oversensitive for me and I use the stick and throttle for those aswell.

People hate it because people would rather just take someone's word for it than trying it out themselves. I can totally picture some 16 year old proclaiming how much it sucks with complete authority and confidence without actually having used it.

There's actually a pretty good chance that happened earlier in this thread.

Yeah, that is something that happens all the time... Strange times. Im getting too Old for this.

People dump on the V4 simply because of it's lower top speed compared to the Cobra III for example, it rotates a tad slower as well.

However what the stats don't tell you is the boost multiplier is where the vipers get their secret special move from, it's crazy agile on boost and the only a cobra iii can do to a V4 is basically run away in a straight line which is not that easy when the V4 accelerates so fast!

It makes a lot of sense what you say. Have not tried pvp, but while doing bounty hunting i quite often encounter the cobra mk3. The cobra gives me a bit of a challange, but once the shots land he is wasted. Same apllies to most small ships. I find it easier to kill medium and large ships in the Viper mk, than small ones.

Other benefits are: the fantastic utility, small so No problem with landing on rough terran, and FAoff provides incredible turn rate. Boost speed lets me extend and turn the fights into a boom n zoom method.

Few days ago i ditched the cargo Bay, srv hangar and some Other modules and fitted it with HRP.

Its much more tanky and there is no agility loss... Fantastic!

 

[fishevi]

I have combat viper mk4 build, super-pens and frags. Sometimes I fly shieldless setup, sometimes with shield.
That's my "friendly neighborhood ganker" ship. I interdict cmdrs, but I miss alpha firepower for gank kill, so they have time to escape me.

So don't block me if I interdict you, if you're unarmed i don't go for kill, if you fight back, we'll have fun

Anyway, fun ship, cheap rebuy

 

[MrScar]

I have combat viper mk4 build, super-pens and frags. Sometimes I fly shieldless setup, sometimes with shield.
That's my "friendly neighborhood ganker" ship. I interdict cmdrs, but I miss alpha firepower for gank kill, so they have time to escape me.

So don't block me if I interdict you, if you're unarmed i don't go for kill, if you fight back, we'll have fun

Anyway, fun ship, cheap rebuy

Maybe if you have a bounty on your head, it will be me interdicting YOU...

But on the more serious side, we all do what we like the most. I am mostly Bounty Hunting, because i simply love it. And I do not scorn someone for being a pirate. Sure, its not pleasant to be blown up, but hey... the galaxy is a dangerous place. Once I had a situation, where I was chasing a player all over the place. He was a pirate, i finally got him, blew him up, and he wrote to me: this was the best fun I had in a few months. Thanks, and fly safe!

I love the MK4, its in my opinion one of the best options for a mostly solo bounty hunter. Truth is I am not thinking of changing the Mk4 for anything else right now, its just so damn good.... even the Vulture with those big guns is not as appealing to me, because its a sprinter. Not too good for long pursuits.

 

[MrScar]

By the way, I am trying to get my hands on pack hound missiles for the Viper MK4. I know missiles can be jammed by ECM, but I wonder what is the on-hand experience with those. Im thinking about combining them with engineered pulse lasers, instead of plasma accelerators for bigger punch when doin RES sites and BH assassination missions.

Idea is to take down the shields and blast the guy as soon as possible, before he has a chance to escape. I love the PA, and they are great for medium to large vessels, but i would like something for small craft as well. Missiles seem to be a good idea.

 

[XIMX]

Hmmm, what control setup do you run? I use a thrustmaster 16000m fcs HOTAS. I have a small stick on the throttle for thrusters. It does feel a bit drifty but i know how to correct it, so that i have smooth approaches.

I use the same setup.
The problem is not so much to make a smooth approach when comming in pretty straight. It's more when I'm coming in close from the side and want to stop that vertical/lateral thrust over the pad or in front of the mail slot.
Viper does not stop anymore and just passes by.

Also I guess the acceleration is reduced massively. Before, outside of combat there was rarely a use for boost as the Viper accelerated to supercruise speed almost as fast without.
If I'm correct and that's true for the maneuvering thrusters too, that maybe explains, why they have problems to stop the ship now.
I hope I'm wrong, because that would be pretty sad...

Anyway, back to praising the Viper Mk.IV:
I rigged mine with two medium pulse lasers, a tiny corrosive MC and a small heat-vented beam. The heat vent doesn't seem to make much sense in this setup, but having the "big" lasers agains shields and then using the MC to apply the corrosive effect, works pretty nice. Also all the weapons are long-ranged. So I try work at distance of about 2km, where they barely hit my bi-weaves. If they decide to run and I'm not fast enough to catch up, they still have get out of my 6km range. But then it's usually too late already. And when the target is unlocked I can avoid the gimbal's ridiculous long-range jitter.
So, still room for improvements and experiments and for sure not most efficient in any specific form of combat, but it feels very versatile and OK for almost every situation I found myself in.
And if things don't work as intended, there's the massive armour giving me time to bug out.
Yes, I like this ship.

 

[S0rkvild]

By the way, I am trying to get my hands on pack hound missiles for the Viper MK4. I know missiles can be jammed by ECM, but I wonder what is the on-hand experience with those. Im thinking about combining them with engineered pulse lasers, instead of plasma accelerators for bigger punch when doin RES sites and BH assassination missions.

Idea is to take down the shields and blast the guy as soon as possible, before he has a chance to escape. I love the PA, and they are great for medium to large vessels, but i would like something for small craft as well. Missiles seem to be a good idea.

Pack hounds don't deal much damage, they are for module targeting only. Very useful in pvp. In pve, not so much. Also you will run out of ammo pretty quick. Speaking of classic missiles they are good against small crafts as all mediums usually carry point defense ranging from one to four and that renders missiles useless.

For small hardpoints if find only ONE best fitting and best working weapon and that is a cytoscrambler. A single cyto deals shield damage slightly greater than a class three fixed beam! Two efficient cytos on a Viper 4 are an excellent choice. For medium hardpoints I would advise a gmialballed corrosive shell multicannon (overcharged or short range) - that is a must - second medium can be anything you like; a frag cannon, a cannon, a pa, a railgun, a missile rack. Cytos are great for shield stripping, multicannon is good against everything and also enhances damage dealt to target, while your second medium weapon is a heavy hitter. I'm using this weapon scheme on all ships with two medium and two small hardpoints (Viper, Cobra, DBS, Keelback) and it works well.

 

[Viscera]

Something to consider for the V4 re medium sized missiles .. you need to lift the nose slightly whilst you try to get a lock on with them.

They are not the easiest thing to get locked on target with this ship.

 

[MrScar]

Pack hounds don't deal much damage, they are for module targeting only. Very useful in pvp. In pve, not so much. Also you will run out of ammo pretty quick. Speaking of classic missiles they are good against small crafts as all mediums usually carry point defense ranging from one to four and that renders missiles useless.

For small hardpoints if find only ONE best fitting and best working weapon and that is a cytoscrambler. A single cyto deals shield damage slightly greater than a class three fixed beam! Two efficient cytos on a Viper 4 are an excellent choice. For medium hardpoints I would advise a gmialballed corrosive shell multicannon (overcharged or short range) - that is a must - second medium can be anything you like; a frag cannon, a cannon, a pa, a railgun, a missile rack. Cytos are great for shield stripping, multicannon is good against everything and also enhances damage dealt to target, while your second medium weapon is a heavy hitter. I'm using this weapon scheme on all ships with two medium and two small hardpoints (Viper, Cobra, DBS, Keelback) and it works well.

Something to consider for the V4 re medium sized missiles .. you need to lift the nose slightly whilst you try to get a lock on with them.

They are not the easiest thing to get locked on target with this ship.

Thanks for the replies. I think i will stick to the PAs and just engineer them. They make the most dmg on medium/large ships, even unengineerd, and the pulse lasers do a good job with small craft aswell. Even to their hull.

Ill tinker around those, thanks for the advice.

 

[Viscera]

Hard not to suggest two small rails for the V4 in my opinion. Excellently placed slots for a pair of them.

Mediums then fall to more what you prefer to back it up. I like an efficient emissive pulse, high ammo corrosive multicannon combination (both gimballed).

I have tried plasma, but as I fly fa on, it is a harder thing to get the bearing on target so often. I would imagine it is a little easier for fa off players...

 

[MrScar]

Hard not to suggest two small rails for the V4 in my opinion. Excellently placed slots for a pair of them.

Mediums then fall to more what you prefer to back it up. I like an efficient emissive pulse, high ammo corrosive multicannon combination (both gimballed).

I have tried plasma, but as I fly fa on, it is a harder thing to get the bearing on target so often. I would imagine it is a little easier for fa off players...

I can tell you it depends against what you are flying. With FAoff the Viper is very agile, but struggles a little with placing plasma rounds on small fast moving targets. I usually use my gimballed pulse lasers to deal with small craft. The Medium and Large ships cannot keep up with the MK4 when doing FAoff maneuvers, and its easier to lead a shot at them.

Cannot say about rails, have not tried them yet honestly, but i think they have a tendency to ovearheat faster than PA (not sure). Before choosing PA, i was thinking about cannons, because they have a gimball mount if I am not mistaken, and can also shred hull quite efficiently. Also the reason for cannons being the cheaper alternative to PA is that they do not drain the WEP capacitor that quickly as the PAs do.

Hm... maybe cannons are also worth a try, or engineered MCs. I heard those can shred armor pretty well, but i fear they might be a bit underpowered against the penetration resistance of larger vessels.

 

[Viscera]

I can tell you it depends against what you are flying. With FAoff the Viper is very agile, but struggles a little with placing plasma rounds on small fast moving targets. I usually use my gimballed pulse lasers to deal with small craft. The Medium and Large ships cannot keep up with the MK4 when doing FAoff maneuvers, and its easier to lead a shot at them.

Cannot say about rails, have not tried them yet honestly, but i think they have a tendency to ovearheat faster than PA (not sure). Before choosing PA, i was thinking about cannons, because they have a gimball mount if I am not mistaken, and can also shred hull quite efficiently. Also the reason for cannons being the cheaper alternative to PA is that they do not drain the WEP capacitor that quickly as the PAs do.

Hm... maybe cannons are also worth a try, or engineered MCs. I heard those can shred armor pretty well, but i fear they might be a bit underpowered against the penetration resistance of larger vessels.

Try rails. They are great. 2 smalls are fine with the size 3 distro, and won't over heat the V4 when used well

 

[MrScar]

Try rails. They are great. 2 smalls are fine with the size 3 distro, and won't over heat the V4 when used well

Ill try it out, thanks

 

[fishevi]

Try rails. They are great. 2 smalls are fine with the size 3 distro, and won't over heat the V4 when used well

This.
I go small LR sup-pens and medium gimballed OC frags, drag and corrosive. No issues with heat.
Not real Maverick here, so this is my "fun" build for Open, when I'm just looking for trouble

But I saw(rebuy) action from serious pilots.
High skill PvP pilot can take medium/large meta builds easily in Viper mk4.

Then again, High skill PvP pilot would probably win in any ship...

Anyway, I lack skill, but I have the ship

 

[Deleted member 115407]

 

[MrScar]

View attachment 233002

Great shot. Did something similar yesterday. I think the patch we had also improved shaders and atmo planets Look way better.

The cockpit of the Viper mk4 looks also way better.

At least those are my impressions

 

[fishevi]

Yes, great screenshot, worthy of wallpaper, like it

 

[Deleted member 115407]

Enjoying being back in the girl...

 

[photomankc]

I made myself an ALT for playing the ummm morally flexible angles in Elite. I was debating between the Cobra and the Viper Mk4. Decided on the Viper for center cockpit and better convergence.

Man. I freaking love this little ship. Only got to G2/G3 on most engineering but running a rails/frag build and it is a joy to fight in. Went with short range blaster on the rails since it’s pretty good at staying on top of my quarry. Outfitted it at times to take those covert procurement missions.

In Odyssey it makes a great base raid ship. Small enough to drop into a depression, deploy the SRV and be my Alamo if it all goes wrong.

I completely missed out on this my first play through really enjoying it now even as a low earning criminal.

 

[Deleted member 115407]

running a rails/frag build

Medium rails, small frags, or vice versa?

 

[Deleted member 115407]

This.
I go small LR sup-pens and medium gimballed OC frags, drag and corrosive. No issues with heat.
Not real Maverick here, so this is my "fun" build for Open, when I'm just looking for trouble

But I saw(rebuy) action from serious pilots.
High skill PvP pilot can take medium/large meta builds easily in Viper mk4.

Then again, High skill PvP pilot would probably win in any ship...

Anyway, I lack skill, but I have the ship

Thanks. I now have something to do this morning
Now for the long ride home.....