Elite: Dangerous Kickstarter Launched

Thanks. I’ve more or less already decided to try the Krait because I mostly do combat anyway and don’t have much interest in hauling stuff around. Are there any good options in mid hull class? From what I read Chieftain is quite nimble (although I guess outclassed by Krait in pure firepower) and a good overall combat oriented ship and the Federal Gunship is supposed to be a beast too, but I don’t have ranks for those. I’m still interested in trying both FAS and FGS though - are they worth it in your opinion?

And a bonus question - is it possible to manually pilot the launched fighter from Krait? Because that would totally tip the scale in its favour :).

Frontier trading update:

I haven’t tried the gunship, so i can’t speak to it. However, i was in the exact position you seem to be in - i loved my vulture, but i was finding it stretched in some of the tougher combats (and I never had anything engineered at that point), so i was looking for something with more heft till i could afford a python. I tried the FAS first, and frankly was flat out disappointed - it flew like a brick and performed worse than the vulture(though i may have expected too much for it). I then when to the chieftain, and while i enjoyed it more it wasn’t the straight-up glory that I had envisioned. I flew it till i got my krait and shortly afterwards, sold it when i realized i was never going to fly it again.

My advice. Save your money. If you haven’t yet, unlock the guardian FSD booster (it’s not terribly hard, just takes a bit of flying mostly). Start engineering - it’s somewhat painful to start, but once you get going and get the hang of it, it’s a game changer for anything/way you want to fly. But an engineered vulture is pretty wicked.

Yes! But doing so means you put your AI pilot in charge of your ship. Still, it’s a hoot (you can also have friends join in and fly it, which is also fun).

Same for my old Anaconda fighter. Incredibly great fun! I used it as an exploration scout as my anaconda followed me around on the ship as I flew over the planet surfaces in my fighter :)

Thanks for that first hand info! I’ve decided in the mean time to keep the vulture as is and slowly upgrade it but I will also be buying a Chieftain very soon - I had a look at Krait but right now I’m unwilling to part with docking computer, interdictor, cruise assist and collector limpets and all 4 are much easier to fit on a Chieftain when I don’t lose one slot to a hangar bay.

edit: Here is the Chieftain build I had in mind. Unfortunately I had to drop one module protection to fit in everything I wanted but I think it looks ok. Should I make any changes? The weapons I’m still undecided on because I’ve been flying gimballed only up until now. I fly with FA on exclusively.

https://s.orbis.zone/c6jo

I’m starting to get the feeling that space police shows up by default in some of these ‘high end’ assassination missions - dangerous and above let’s say. Yesterday I took a few master level contracts in the range of ~2.5m and beat them with ease in my non-engi Vulture thanks to about 4-5 security ships that joined the fun every time.

Is this normal behaviour or does it depend on my rank (currently Expert) too?

It depends on a setting in your right hand screen, ship tab “notify authorities” or somesuch thing.

Do you mean “report crimes against me”? If so I don’t think that’s the case, because the ships are already there when I jump (not always, but sometimes). And I’ve read that if you’re doing a mission from another faction’s perspective you end up fighting the same security forces.

Either way, it’s fun! :)

Unrelated, here’s the Krait Mk.2 build I’m thinking of going with - https://s.orbis.zone/c7jE . Thoughts?

Nice ship, I bet she’ll serve you well. I would exchange the point defense for a chaff launcher.

Good call, I will definitely try it out since point defense I have now on Vulture is hardly seeing any use.

So I actually ended up buying both ships today and flew them for a couple of hours - and while both have their pros and cons I really prefer the Chieftain due to its agility, plus I don’t have to keep an eye out on the fighter - although I do miss them sometimes because they can be a great distraction vs tougher targets.

Here is the build I’m using atm, but I will likely tweak it a bit more - maybe even drop limpets once I stock up on mats and add 2 more hull reinforcements instead of cargo+collector.

https://s.orbis.zone/c9fS

I will probably try the Frag cannons at first opporunity.

I look forward to revisiting Krait once I get engineering going finally though.

Can you elaborate on this? Did you buy (and flew) the fleet carrier or did you have someone transport you? I’m still learning the ropes after a long absence and I’d love to know more about the various systems the game offers.

Fleet carriers are end-game ships that are owned but not piloted by players. The owner can set a destination for them to travel to and they will go there (travelling on the server tick, iirc). The owner (and with permission other players) can dock and trade with the fleet carrier.

I assume that krazykrok docked with someone’s fleet carrier then logged out and didn’t return for a while, by which time it had been moved a long way back towards human-occupied space.

That’s pretty cool, thanks for the explanation!

White dwarf?

On pause while I do the engineer grind. Not going to lie, it’s sucking the fun out of the game for me.

Man, I would love to get back into this again sometime.

Maybe I have had a long enough break it would be fresh enough to grind out some money and engineering. Last time I played I had worked my way up to a high end Vulture, and always wanted to upgrade that, but I never really got close to enough money to do that. It sounds like that Krait Mk II would be a blast to fly!

I also never did any engineering, so would be going in blind on all of that. Maybe I will see if I still have it installed and dig up my flight hardware and look up a little bit on what is involved to do engineering.

Look no further - Guide to Unlocking Engineers Quickly — CMDRs ToolBox

You will also need to spend a few hours (minimum) gathering the necessary materials to actually level up the engineers once you unlock them.

Awesome! Thank you!

Similar for me. I jumped back in after getting a new VR headset and finally got my first Engineer unlocked in preparation for upgrading my Vulture, but I’m not sure I’m in for the grind just yet.