Time I started blowing stuff up, advice needed!

[The Galactic Penguin]

Howdy folks,

I'll freely admit that I was always more into exploration, trading and mining than the combat side of things (and probably always will be) and I've worked various RP reasons into my character's backstory to support this. However, I've decided that the time has come to finally dip my toes into blowing stuff up and filling the vacuum of space with the wrecks of pirates who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. After all, now I have a system of my own, I have some turf to protect. Crewe Station will be kept free of the piratical scourge!!

So, some basic questions really. For a pilot who has never flown Flight Assist Off yet, and who plans to engage in combat only in solo play against AI enemies, is it likely to be the case that any well-engineered combat ship will likely be a good choice, such that it's really more about personal preference, or can AI pilots be pretty devastating?

I'm currently feeling tempted by various Alliance ships and (for RP reasons and because I have a fair bit of Federal rank) the Federal gunship, but I have zero combat experience or knowledge so if you good folks think there's a ship out there that's brill for teaching a combat n00b the ropes, I'm all ears!

Finally, thanks in advance for all the advice folks!

 

[The Galactic Penguin]

Sorry for the massive typo in the thread title, blinkin' 'eck!

 

[forbiddenlake]

What's your budget?

You may want to start with a small (Vulture), or you can jump right to a medium (Chieftain/Challenger/Krait II) if you like, and don't mind the risk of paying more rebuy.

In PvE you can choose your opponents' difficulty, so yes, you can make anything work. You should avoid Conflict Zones and Pirate Activity Detected when starting out because they are tough and pay poorly.
Engineering is a huge leg up.



This is my guide, I didn't write it originally but I do edit it now, full of boring-yet-effective MC/Pulse and MC/Rail builds: https://sites.google.com/view/ed-pve-combat/overview

 

[The Galactic Penguin]

Thanks for the guide! I've got about 3.3 billion in the bank atm so budget's not a problem these days really (mind you, I'm a cheapskate in real life so I'm still going to try not to ding the paint on my combat ship! ). The Challenger looks interesting, especially with all those military compartments, looks as though it'll have good survivability if I mess things up (which I'm bound to really to begin with!).

 

[Monk]

Earn your chops in an Eagle Mk2. If your combat rank is still pretty low you should get massacre missions or signal sources that are on your level (most of the time).

Take risks, Eagles are cheap. You learn by failure, so fail a lot. Challenge yourself to solo something big.

You'll learn to pick your targets and will see how focusing on sub-targets can tip the balance in your favor when over-matched. You'll also learn how to manage your power for combat as the Eagle is pretty limited there. Get your feet wet in Low/Medum/High resource extraction sites where you can rely on the local fuzz to get you out of a bind. Hazardous sites have the biggest meanies and no security support.

EDIT to add: Once you feel comfortable in an Eagle, its all a simple "ride around the block" to get familiar and effective with a bigger ship.

 

[DjVortex]

Most combat ships are easy to distinguish because they look like combat ships. The Eagle is probably the cheapest, but it's really small and doesn't pack that much of a punch, so you may be for very long fights. The Cobra Mk V is really good for combat and can pack much more of a punch, but also being a small ship veers it more towards the "technique is more effective than sheer firepower" side. If you want a badass medium-sized combat ship, that would be the Krait Mk II.

If you haven't unlocked the engineers for shields and hull, I recommend doing so, as those engineerings are almost a must. I recommend getting very strong shields (by both a large shield generator as well as shield boosters, all of them engineered for heavy duty) and hull reinforcement packages and module reinforcement packages (the former should be engineered for heavy duty).

There's an extremely wide variety of weapon choices, but if you want an easy but quite effective newbie-friendly choice, put a gimballed auto-cannon on each hard point. That will do nicely, and you don't even need to be shuffling around different weapon types. You can try different engineerings for them, but as for the experimental effect, definitely use "Auto Loader", which is almost essential for auto-cannons (it allows you to fire almost continuously without any reloading interruptions. Just remember to put some pips into WEP.)

That setup will help you take down all but the toughest NPCs.

 

[Felix DiCestria]

Personally I started with Thargoids Scouts in a Krait II with an AX Taipan.
Ultimately anything goes, though you might want to start with a Krait or P2.
For myself I never got on with the Fed bricks, I got them when we're on sale but spent most of the time as module storage.
Weapon-wise will depend on your confidence. I generally use fixed weapons on small and medium ships, switching to gimballed for larger ships.
FAon/off is again largely personal preference.

 

[Staarlord]

Something like this

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

Perfect, for someone wanting to learn advanced (fixed) weaponry in haz res and also collect mats and explore. Everything here is short range, so you stay on their six. Cannons act as shotgun slugs in this arrangement.

Choose whatever experimental for hard points you like (can't go too wrong with anything these days).

I use clean drives because the Mandalay is super peppy with it and I can fuel scoop as close to a star as I want and practically go AFK with no heat buildup, which is great for exploring. Keeping heat as low as possible, so you can SCO for virtually ever as well.

It's a wee bit overpowered on deployment, but in these situations I see the cargo rack to priority 4 and the FSD and fuel scoop to priority 5. Priority 5 will kick in and disable those modules upon weapon deployment and cargo rack will shut off only if for some reason that isn't enough, or you take power plant damage.

Most people turn off cargo rack straight away but in situations where I have collector limpets I want to be able to deploy them and gather material. Therefore I only priority 5 cargo (or outright keep it off) if I'm in a strictly combat build.

 

[Comandante]

Full FA Off - i.e. all the time - is not for the faint-hearted.

However, doing a 180 degree turn using just FA off can offer a little bit of extra time being able to face your enemy again, switching back to FA On once you've gone 180.

To prove it (not in combat), pick a distant object e.g. asteroid/planet whatever (make sure it's selected), go to the middle of the blue zone with speed, then start the turn without FA Off - and wait until it's in your rear target. Time this several times to see how long it takes on average.

Now do the same again switching on at the start and off at the end with FA. You'll notice there's a small but albeit significant improvement in time. That time means more time you're laying into your opponent. I'd say that would be the start of your learning trail for learning FA off and is a good tool to have under your belt.

Other than that I'd also suggest different ships - don't stick to one. I'd agree with others in that starting off smaller is better than bigger.

Haz Rez where there are cops is a good one because they can provide a bit of help.

I think you'll have fun!

 

[GroG79]

Vulture....

Then later get a medium

 

[Brrokk]

Howdy folks,

I'll freely admit that I was always more into exploration, trading and mining than the combat side of things (and probably always will be) and I've worked various RP reasons into my character's backstory to support this. However, I've decided that the time has come to finally dip my toes into blowing stuff up and filling the vacuum of space with the wrecks of pirates who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. After all, now I have a system of my own, I have some turf to protect. Crewe Station will be kept free of the piratical scourge!!

So, some basic questions really. For a pilot who has never flown Flight Assist Off yet, and who plans to engage in combat only in solo play against AI enemies, is it likely to be the case that any well-engineered combat ship will likely be a good choice, such that it's really more about personal preference, or can AI pilots be pretty devastating?

I'm currently feeling tempted by various Alliance ships and (for RP reasons and because I have a fair bit of Federal rank) the Federal gunship, but I have zero combat experience or knowledge so if you good folks think there's a ship out there that's brill for teaching a combat n00b the ropes, I'm all ears!

Finally, thanks in advance for all the advice folks!

I've never really bothered to learn FA-off flight, but PvE combat is fine without it. I tend to prefer larger ships with gimbal or turret weapons. This reduces combat to selecting target, pressing appropriate fire button and controlling engagement range - which IMO is good SF and probably realistic.

Most of my combat builds feature a long-range laser to take off shield and then short-range multi cannons with effects (always one corrosive). Short-range turret MCs don't waste ammo when too far away. Lately I've been able to mix in some Packhound missiles.

Shields for PvE: I usually have biweaves engineered for thermal resistance and fast charge.

 

[aRJay]

Howdy folks,

I'll freely admit that I was always more into exploration, trading and mining than the combat side of things (and probably always will be) and I've worked various RP reasons into my character's backstory to support this. However, I've decided that the time has come to finally dip my toes into blowing stuff up and filling the vacuum of space with the wrecks of pirates who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. After all, now I have a system of my own, I have some turf to protect. Crewe Station will be kept free of the piratical scourge!!

So, some basic questions really. For a pilot who has never flown Flight Assist Off yet

I am somewhere above Elite in Combat and only use FA Off to put down on planets. So don’t let yourself be talked into using it if you don’t want to.

, and who plans to engage in combat only in solo play against AI enemies, is it likely to be the case that any well-engineered combat ship will likely be a good choice, such that it's really more about personal preference, or can AI pilots be pretty devastating?

Yes.
As long as it is tough enough, agile enough and has enough punch you being happy flying it is what matters, much better to have fun than be bored in a meta ship.
Yes some NPCs can be a problem.

I'm currently feeling tempted by various Alliance ships and (for RP reasons and because I have a fair bit of Federal rank) the Federal gunship, but I have zero combat experience or knowledge so if you good folks think there's a ship out there that's brill for teaching a combat n00b the ropes, I'm all ears!

Finally, thanks in advance for all the advice folks!

The Alliance ships are quite good though can feel a little fragile, the Chieftain is not too expensive to learn in.
The Gunship ought to be good but it is one I don’t like flying so don’t use.

Start out just shooting Wanted ships at Nav Beacons or RES don’t bother with Compromised Nav Beacons and Haz RES until you are ready to not have any support from security.

Keep in mind if you are keen to rank up you should focus on ta4gets higher ranked than yourself and don’t use an SLF pilot as they will take half your XP.

 

[Titler]

Not mentioned so far; Ship bourne fighters with NPC crew will effectively distract enemies, especially 1v1 and at higher combat rank, and allow you to learn a bit better. You can keep using them but they also eat your profits and elite ranking gains; I've kept mine out of fondness, and I'm already very rich so I dont mind the 2b the two have taken each. Much. Really, I don't mind at all, and it means in my PvE Federal Corvette I can take on Wing assasinations solo with them... but you can sack them if you're happy fighting by yourself once you've got the basics down.

 

[The Galactic Penguin]

Well folks,

I just wanted to check back in with you all to say a huge thank you for the help and advice! I'm (literally) having a blast in my all-new, all-singing, all-dancing, all-killing Alliance Chieftain replete with G5 Powerplant, G5 bi-weave shields, G3 thrusters, G3 beam lasers (Thermal Vent, naturally) and four soon-to-be G5 multi-cannons!

I've been absolutely ripping hostile ships to shreds at compromised Nav beacons, Medium intensity conflict zones and all manner of RES (yet to delve into a hazardous one yet though).

I outfitted the ship with a Kill Warrant Scanner for the full bounty hunting experience and have been generally blowing people up and protecting the defenceless with my awesome space hammer of justice! I had absolutely no idea how quickly you can rip a Cobra Mk3's shields and hull apart.......they just...... melt!

Combat in this game is such an absorbing and immersive experience, I had absolutely no idea! The graphics, the ship handling and especially the sound just bring it all together.


Having a great time folks, thanks again for all the help!