Newcomer / Intro What next? - Bounty Hunting/Combat Ship (Returning player)

MrScar

MrScar
First of all, Hello to everyone since this is my first post on the forum.

I. To introduce myself a little, I am a returning player after around 3 years. Now that Oddysey is around the corner and the space legs aspect is the thing that I find vital for my gameplay experience, I want to hop in and start playing again. Before Oddysey, I was mainly doing:

1. Space Trucker jobs and a bit of exploration in order to earn money.
2. Easier BH missions and low intensity conflict zones
3. Have not touched the Engineers yet.
4. I have a Petty Officer Rank with the Federation, so i think i have access to some of the Fed ships. I was aiming at the Federal Corvette at some point of time, but got bored with space trucking.
5. I prefer gaming for the immersion and not meta.

Now the reason why I am writing this post is because after 3 years, probably a lot has changed and I have trouble deciding what to do next in order to have a nice combat platform. I wonder if i should stick to a smaller, but better upgraded ship, or try my luck with something bigger but less advanced module wise. I got a feeling that EvE Online policy "Dont fly what you cannot afford" does also apply a bit to ED. But now that Oddysey is almost here combat and on foot combat are my main point of interest, that I would like to practice 70% of the time now. 30% being exploration. Thats why i think the Krait MK2 is a very good idea for the future, because it can do it all after a retrofit for a specific task. And also the Krait simply looks exactlty the way I would want my ship to look.

II. So now, a few points about my current status and give you a better understanding at what point I am in the game:

1. I have a A grade, non engineered, energy efficient Vulture with a Pulse Laser and Multicannon Combo. Worth around 20mln.
2. With that Vulture I have around 80mln free cash.
3. I am most interested in the Krait MK 2 and it is the ship that I would like to stick to for a very long time, however I do realize I cannot even afford A grade upgrades for those now.

I did a bit of research and was digging around the forums, and most people recommend the following things, however they do so while taking into account that money is not a problem:

1. Do the Engineers because it is vital for the upgrades.
2. The Recommended Krait Mk2 builds start from 200mln which I cannot afford

III. Because I do not have that money now, mow my questions are:

1. Should I stick to the Vulture or some other ship that I can afford, do Bounty Hunting/Merc work to earn cash and rep, and in the meantime start also doing the Engineers, and leave the Krait MK2 for later, once i have a better financial situation? If yes, any suggestions?
2. Should I hop into the Krait MK2, but try my luck with worse modules and simply take it easy with missions so that I don`t get overwhelmed. If yes, do you have any recommended builds for a Krait MK2, knowing that I have around 100mln cash in total. Question is, is it worth it and a worse built non engineered Krait will do better than a A grade non engineered Vulture?
3. Or should I try some other activity for now, to earn the cash for the at least A grade equipped Krait?

Thank you for reading through my spam and I appreciate the feedback.
 

Ashnak

Ashnak
1) is a contradiction in itself. To unlock the Engineers, you'll need to do all of the activities in the game - combat, trade, mining, exploration. Kind of hard to do with a single ship unless you have the Engineers unlocked, and even then difficult. But yes, if you want to go on, you'll need engineering - and take your focus off combat, at least for a while.

So, at 80M, I'd suggest you get a Cobra or Dolphin, set it up with a decent FSD and make the trip out to the Pleiades to collect some meta alloys. Yes, LeKeno has a carrier in Deciat and hands out single meta alloys to anyone asking (check his thread in the newcomers section) - but you'll still need the exploration rank to have Felicity even speak to you. Depending how long you want to take, that trip can also make you >70 MCr. in exploration payout.
Unlocking the other engineers can seem similarly challenging (don't complain about Felicity until you have unlocked the Prof.), but it's all doable. If you want to get to your engineered ship fast, you'll likely also fall into the materials grind - don't do it. Engineering requires materials you can collect during gameplay. Some of which you may have seen left over from destroyed enemies. Others are available otherwise.

As for that Krait - my combat Krait (with cargo storage, for those missions where the cargo absolutely has to get there) runs at 280 MCr. - includingsome Powerplay toys and Guardian goodies. So that would also be my other recommendation - check out Powerplay and the Guardians. Powerplay can give you goodies which are (mostly) very interesting for combat pilots, the Guardian ruins have blueprints that let you craft stuff that's useful for ordinary combat and indispensable for Thargoid combat.

So yes, belay that Krait. If you want to go up from the Vulture as a combat ship, take a look at (for you) new Alliance ships - Chieftain, Crusader, Challenger. Pretty much useless for anything besides combat - same as the Vulture.
 

WreckRoot

WreckRoot
To me, the TLDR; of this game is:
1. Engineering is vital to do any reasonable combat. An engineered ship can easily do two-three times the sustained damage output of an unengineered ship and have ten times the effective durability, in addition to being 50% faster and more maneuverable. I wouldn't bother doing combat for anything other than a thrill/challenge without engineering. Certainly if you want to make any money out of it (other than the trick of tagging wanted ships in RES sites which has nothing to do with combat imho), you need some engineering.
2. There are many ways to get money, all of them have tons of guides on youtube, e.g. laser mining, passenger missions and trading. I personally find them boring as all hell, so as soon as I got out of the noob zone (something added after you took the break) I immediately jumped into core mining and it's my preferred way of making money to this day. I find it much more fun (feels more like racing than mining the way I do it), but I understand it's more sophisticated than other methods.
3. A good "first step" in my opinion is getting a universal ship that will allow you to do most of the tasks for engineers and equip it with the best FSD possible (cause you'll be flying around a lot). I got an Asp Explorer and equipped it with an FSD v1 as soon as I was able, though this was when that module was discounted so you'll probably be better off with getting felicity to apply the increased range + mass manager instead. I was able to core mine in it, explore (including the 5000 LY trip required for prof. Palin) and haul a bit, whenever an engineer required it. Once I got my engineers set up, I made an all-rail Krait and that was my biggest mistake ever cause it turns all of PVE combat into cake walk and moving into any other "meta" ship feels like a downgrade :p . I'm hoping when I get elite in combat, enemy NPCs become a bit more demanding and I'll be forced into some other build, cause right now I can do elite-rank wing assassination missions solo 🤷‍♂️ .
4. For engineering materials, refer to this guide.
 
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MrScar

MrScar
WreckRoot said:
To me, the TLDR; of this game is:
1. Engineering is vital to do any reasonable combat. An engineered ship can easily do two-three times the sustained damage output of an unengineered ship and have ten times the effective durability, in addition to being 50% faster and more maneuverable. I wouldn't bother doing combat for anything other than a thrill/challenge without engineering. Certainly if you want to make any money out of it (other than the trick of tagging wanted ships in RES sites which has nothing to do with combat imho), you need some engineering.
2. There are many ways to get money, all of them have tons of guides on youtube, e.g. laser mining, passenger missions and trading. I personally find them boring as all hell, so as soon as I got out of the noob zone (something added after you took the break) I immediately jumped into core mining and it's my preferred way of making money to this day. I find it much more fun (feels more like racing than mining the way I do it), but I understand it's more sophisticated than other methods.
3. A good "first step" in my opinion is getting a universal ship that will allow you to do most of the tasks for engineers and equip it with the best FSD possible (cause you'll be flying around a lot). I got an Asp Explorer and equipped it with an FSD v1 as soon as I was able, though this was when that module was discounted so you'll probably be better off with getting felicity to apply the increased range + mass manager instead. I was able to core mine in it, explore (including the 5000 LY trip required for prof. Palin) and haul a bit, whenever an engineer required it. Once I got my engineers set up, I made an all-rail Krait and that was my biggest mistake ever cause it turns all of PVE combat into cake walk and moving into any other "meta" ship feels like a downgrade :p . I'm hoping when I get elite in combat, enemy NPCs become a bit more demanding and I'll be forced into some other build, cause right now I can do elite-rank wing assassination missions solo 🤷‍♂️ .
4. For engineering materials, refer to this guide.
Click to expand...

You just literally described the same thing I was thinking about doing. In a nutshell:
Get an AspX,
Get some more money via mining,
Do engi stuff

As for the "End game", when I have the cash and some of engineers stuff done I will probably also choose the Krait MK2, Mamba or one of the Chieftains. This is because I want a medium ship for flexibility + space legs are almost there, and I will be doing a lot of "boots on the ground" stuff.

Anyway, thank you for your 2 cents. Much appreciated.
 

WreckRoot

WreckRoot
MrScar said:
You just literally described the same thing I was thinking about doing. In a nutshell:
Get an AspX,
Get some more money via mining,
Do engi stuff

As for the "End game", when I have the cash and some of engineers stuff done I will probably also choose the Krait MK2, Mamba or one of the Chieftains. This is because I want a medium ship for flexibility + space legs are almost there, and I will be doing a lot of "boots on the ground" stuff.

Anyway, thank you for your 2 cents. Much appreciated.
Click to expand...
I chose Krait for its multirole aspect - it has a fighter hangar (I wanted to try that out), an SRV (in case I have a land-based mission) and a jump range of some 35LY (respectable for a combat ship). It's important to me cause I have very little time to play and I need to minimize downtime (swapping ships, unnecessary travel time) .

If you just want a combat ship - FDL. Better than krait in every way except crap jump range, no fighter and can't boost as often. One of the Krait's cool features that isn't obvious is a very cheap and low cooldown boost. You can boost nonstop on 2 pips ENG if PD is engineered. It's important in my build cause I need 4 pips in WEP pretty much all the time so I don't cook myself :p
 
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