Will hull tanking and PVE ever be a viable option?

Junky Juke

Junky Juke
I like federation ships, a lot. The brute force, the drifting, the rude design, the "vintage" style...
All the medium sized federal ships seem to be PVP oriented as they have low shields and high armour, plus a nice hardpoint distribution that incentivates the use of fixed weapons. That's ok, but what about PVE?

Problem is that shield tanking is "free of charge", while the hull needs repairs which costs add to the ammo restock, making the dropship, fas and fgs at least less beneficial than the imperial counterparts when talking about PVE intensive activities like CZ and HazRES pew pew.

I recently heavily engineered my Dropship (yeh... the Dropship! :p ) and I have to say that with a good shield resistance tweaking, power efficient weaponry and careful target picking she can do the job (mostly). But I feel that I'm cutting out its true potential: the armor! I would like to strip off the shields and make it to become the real tank.

I heared some corridor voices about "armor limpets" or such. Is there any hope to see in the future the ability to repair the hulls during the fight and to open a new way to all the armor tanked ships? Any news about that? How many of you would love to get rid of shields and bring in some true iron into the fight?

Regards
JJ
 

golden_eye

golden_eye
I use my hybrid FAS regularly again since MRPs have been introduced. The money I make vastly outweighs the cost incurred in repairs due to shields dropping regularly.
 

ShimEnki

ShimEnki
golden_eye said:
I use my hybrid FAS regularly again since MRPs have been introduced. The money I make vastly outweighs the cost incurred in repairs due to shields dropping regularly.
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I too really like the Fed ships and have not had the chance to test if the MRPs really do resist module damage for very long( conda has 3600mjs p) but----do they?
 

goemon

goemon
ShimEnki said:
I too really like the Fed ships and have not had the chance to test if the MRPs really do resist module damage for very long( conda has 3600mjs p) but----do they?
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it's really okay, as i can tell from my FGS, which i use at comp nav beacons. the main problem is hardpoints due to missiles .... so bring pointdefence. also i have an AFMU, to repair the 2 MRP in between.
 

ShimEnki

ShimEnki
goemon said:
it's really okay, as i can tell from my FGS, which i use at comp nav beacons. the main problem is hardpoints due to missiles .... so bring pointdefence. also i have an AFMU, to repair the 2 MRP in between.
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Thanks, and I'd have not considered the field maint. thinking they don't really work! Must have been from the early days of AFMUs?
 

goemon

goemon
ShimEnki said:
Thanks, and I'd have not considered the field maint. thinking they don't really work! Must have been from the early days of AFMUs?
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probably. also they got a huge buff in repairing HRP and MRP in the last patch. in both speed and amount they repair on those.
 

racer1

racer1
I've been experimenting with not running when shields drop lately, PvE.

You still don't have long before you need to run IMO. Even with HRP/MRP mix.

For a small number of engagements this is fine but if you are planning to stay in RES until out of ammo you are likely to find yourself out of hull first.

So shield tanking is still more viable I think, but armour can be a bit of fun on the side.
 

Conch

Conch
I hulltank allmost everyday with my FAS. Just need to make selene your BFF and buff it up to +-4000 armor..
 

Thetele

T
Hull tank will never be a good thing in pve if shield exist in this game. There is no way. Hull have repair cost, shields don't. Hull tanking works in pvp because you need to go to rearm often, usually after every serious fight and the idea of pvp build is to stay alive short time until you can kill the enemy while pve builds purpose is to stay and farm for hour or hours.
 

Bortas

Bortas
Tbh I have no idea, why some devs and players are trying so hard to shift the game from shield tanking to hull tanking.

What's wrong with relying on shields in a sci fi game and regarding hull armor as a kind of backup to buy enough time to escape in case of shield-collapse?
 

Flavourless

Flavourless
Just a fun historical note. When the shield energy banks were down in the Elite Cobra III the hull exploded immediately. Armour=0.
 

rucky

rucky
Bortas said:
Tbh I have no idea, why some devs and players are trying so hard to shift the game from shield tanking to hull tanking.

What's wrong with relying on shields in a sci fi game and regarding hull armor as a kind of backup to buy enough time to escape in case of shield-collapse?
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right, but... there are some ships where shield tanking is - simple as that - not possible (i.e. the fed triple).
I tried hard, but 526MJ and 55% resistance is not tanking very much aggro in CZs...
 
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Deleted member 38366

D
Hull Tanking and Shield Tanking aren't exclusive ;)

One would be ill-advised to run a pure Shield Tank with minimal Hull (although some Ship and Ship builds allow for it), but also ill-advised to run entirely Shieldless without any need.
Shields rebuild over time - Hull doesn't, so it's a good idea to use that advantage.

When it comes to NPCs... well... there's numerous issues, since they don't follow the rules in many aspects and not even the Special Effects of Weapons we can equip all work properly on them.
Thus, what likely works like a charm in PvP will not work at all (or poorly) in PvE. I don't see that changing anytime soon.

PvE will still mean :
- fighting Aimbots (no matter what Silent Running or Low Heat is employed)
- fighting inertia-free Ships (they don't suffer from it like our Ships do)
- fighting Ships that can fire selective Afterburner, without gaining the forward momentum our own Ships would get from our Digital, fixed-duration boost
- Ships that run Grade 8 Dirty Drives in terms of agiliy
- Ships which hardly ever sustain hardpoint or module damage, even if their Hull has been hammered to near 0%
- Ships which don't suffer from the initial 70% PowerPlant malfunction
- Ships that can HiWake with upto 90deg misalignment to the jump destination or even while flying backwards
 
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Lawlazyboy

L
I love hull tanking in my Anaconda :) I can get it upto almost 7000 Armour with shield boosters and a bi weave. Doesn't really bother me if my shields go down, I just wait for them to recharge and come back up.
 
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