To Asp or not to Asp...and so forth

[Darth Ender]

So, I rock a tricked out Viper with nearly 4mil invested in it. It is strictly combat. There aren't many npc ships that get through shields (no scb's) before dying let alone make me have to retreat (mostly just elite anacondas). I enjoy it, but when it comes to income rate, I feel like i've peaked with this ship. With the 70+k anaconda's outside of my grasp, and the 50-60k asp's and conda's taking a relatively longer amount of time to destroy, my income rate is roughly 100k before having to return to base, < 10k in damages and integrity and cannon ammo and this usually takes about 15 - 20 min a cycle. So i'm looking at roughly half a million an hour. Strictly bounty hunting.

So, that brings me to the question at hand. Do you think the asp could yield a higher combat income rate when eventually tricked out full combat-mode than the viper? Or would they be roughly equal due to higher repair costs in the asp and the infrequency of the ships outside of the reach of the viper leaving you a roughly unchanged selection of bad guys to kill?

A broader question, at what point does combat scale up for larger ships if it does at all? Are you forced to just take assassination missions (if you can find any)? Trade scales, mining is a laughable joke on any level, but combat it seems has no mechanism for scaling much further beyond what you can take out in a viper. There are no real pirate/mafia convoys you can prey on that you couldn't in a smaller ship. I often see convoys of "clean" ships for various reasons (weddings, funerals, etc) but never any wanted convoys. Big miss FD.

 

[mistohise]

I just traded to the Asp, and it's a good all-round ship but it's not something I'd be flying if I were only interested in combat.

Something shaved 20% off my hull earlier and it cost 25k to repair, so the 45k bounty I got for killing him was almost halved. In a smaller ship, you just don't have to outlay as much, even if you are packing less heat overall.

 

[talshiarr]

To Asp or not to Asp. There is no question. Unless all you want to do is combat, anyway. One run up to the Leesti rare cluster even with a comparatively light cargo load can easily net you over a million credits when repair bills pile up.

 

[Shyeer Alvarin]

In all honesty, I'd go with the Asp. Rock single beam and five multicannons and you will get more kills faster. More cr/hr will offset your repair costs. Upgrading your shield will also help negate repairs so long as you're wise about your power management.

Full pips to weapons while you run the beam to drop shields, pips to shields and the multicannons will run darn near forever.

 

[StarTux]

The Asp is more akin to a larger Cobra, I think this is the best way to describe it.

Not sure how the Fer-De-lance will shape up in 1.2 either, that's open to speculation .

 

[Rubbernuke]

My Asp has six multicannons and it goes Kenwood on small targets, and makes good work of larger ones.

 

[EUS]

I'm not sure what you mean by anocondas out of reach, the sole reason my viper is not sold, is to perform those beautiful 150-200K killing pirate lord missions. The last time I did this, the local authorities didn't even bother to show up, the ingrates.
I have an Asp for trading, a Viper (with fuel scoop) for fighting.

 

[Doctor Axel]

For those who have Asped before - I'm closing in on having the wealth to obtain one, but the weapons placement is kind of weirding me out. If two of the Class 1 mounts were on top instead of on the bottom, you could wrap the thing in turrets and be a nice little gunboat. But the placement seems wrong for that.

 

[Rubbernuke]

For those who have Asped before - I'm closing in on having the wealth to obtain one, but the weapons placement is kind of weirding me out. If two of the Class 1 mounts were on top instead of on the bottom, you could wrap the thing in turrets and be a nice little gunboat. But the placement seems wrong for that.

I've never used turrets, but I have fought Asps with them and its coverage was pretty good. Its only real blind spot is dead astern.

 

[mistohise]

I have an Asp and still don't really know where the weapons are mounted...

 

[Scoob]

For those who have Asped before - I'm closing in on having the wealth to obtain one, but the weapons placement is kind of weirding me out. If two of the Class 1 mounts were on top instead of on the bottom, you could wrap the thing in turrets and be a nice little gunboat. But the placement seems wrong for that.

I love my Asp, though I too was surprised by the weapons layout. I like how I can pop in to Outfitting and transform it between a trader with 116+ tonne capacity, a Miner with a large 7 hopper refinery or a combat ship with Class 6 shields. I also fitted Class 5 shields and a good FSD to do some rares runs - enough cargo (80t) to carry what I need and good enough shielding (and other equipment) to survive the inevitable skirmish en route. A fine ship, though I hated it at first - my fault as it wasn't so well equipped and I got jumped by an Expert Cobra who kited all around me while I struggled to get a bead on him...such encounters turn out differently now

Scoob.

 

[starjump]

ASP for doing a bit of everything and a smaller fighter for fun-time. Thats what i aim for right now at least.

 

[Lestat]

I would keep the Viper as a backups ship. So if your ASP destroy you can go back to a Viper.

 

[MarcusReed]

I love my ASP, but my A fit viper is more fun to fly, travels faster between bounty conda missions and combat zones. With rebuy cost of 100k and can easly make a mill an hour bounty hunting and mission running. The use of an ASP for this does not seem necessary with the current repair and upkeep cost of the ASP. I do believe the ASP needs to be nerfed ( I know developers hate that word). It shouldn't be able to run beams as long as it does, so I am expecting a huge nerf bat soon for the ASP.

 

[Darth Ender]

I dont hang around the starter systems or core worlds. I'm waiting for FD to fix their issues with players who like to log off before venturing back to popular areas. The system I'm currently making home is quite popular with the wanted folks, and far enough away that i've only seen a human player maybe once in the last two weeks. So I interdict a steady stream of wanted npcs while I play, all between 10k to 60k + their extra bounties if any.

So it looks like, to trick out my new asp I'd need to build up about 5mil for the top end power plant, 450k for power distributor, 1.2 mil for sensors, 5 mil for shields. 5 mil for thrusters, and 6mil for hull. So roughly 22.6mil and that doesn't include weapons and accessories.

Talking straight combat, I would have to wonder if that is something that can be sustainable on a bounty hunter's income given the current game state. It seems like the game basically forces you to have to get into trade for these larger multi-million dollar ships. Human player bounties aside, how much do you Asp pilots make on average bounty hunting post 1.1? I dont think the number of wanted players and their bounties scales just because you have a bigger more expensive ship, so how does a bounty hunting Asp pilot pay for their upgrades other than grinding 10+ times as long as you would trading?

Do you make significantly more money in missions and mostly do that? Or maybe frequent combat zones all the time? Doing the interdiction thing in the system I've found with the most wanted people per hour, I can't see making more than 700k an hour in bounties. Maybe I'm underestimating that number though, let me know what you guys normally see. I'd like to avoid trading if at all possible.

 

[Darth Krayt]

I'm not a combat type guy, but have 4 turrets at the bottom and 2 gimballed on top. They are all pulse chosen for low power usage and not having to bother with refilling ammo. If the target is slightly above your center line then the turrets won't fire so you have to pull the nose up to get all 6 weapons to hit. It still makes short work of AI Eagles or Vipers though.

 

[Darth Ender]

I love my ASP, but my A fit viper is more fun to fly, travels faster between bounty conda missions and combat zones. With rebuy cost of 100k and can easly make a mill an hour bounty hunting and mission running. The use of an ASP for this does not seem necessary with the current repair and upkeep cost of the ASP. I do believe the ASP needs to be nerfed ( I know developers hate that word). It shouldn't be able to run beams as long as it does, so I am expecting a huge nerf bat soon for the ASP.

I would expect beam lasers to last a very long time on the asp with top end power plant and power distributor. You have a huge amount of mass in that ship to dissipate heat into. It should last significantly longer than a fully upgraded viper or cobra and my viper can lay a beam down long enough to nearly if not fully deshield any npc ASP i've ever crossed.

I'm mostly interested in the asp as a means for properly playing with the rail gun and plasma accelerator. These weapons are commonly used by npcs these days and when they manage to land them, they tear my top end shields up on my viper, even fully pipped. Their heat load leaves a lot to be desired though. at least by the numbers.

 

[bassman]

So it looks like, to trick out my new asp I'd need to build up about 5mil for the top end power plant, 450k for power distributor, 1.2 mil for sensors, 5 mil for shields. 5 mil for thrusters, and 6mil for hull. So roughly 22.6mil and that doesn't include weapons and accessories.

Unlike smaller ships you dont need to totally A-grade on the asp, go for an A grade distributor but you can get by with with running 1 or 2 a/b grade other components depending on what your using it for.

 

[Zarlok]

I have worked my way up to an Asp having a Cobra first. I find it to be a good all rounder. Yes the repair bills on fighting can be a little high however I can then go off and haul nearly 100 cargo and make around 1 mill per hour. So you get the best of both worlds with a ship that is a bit of an all rounder.