Elite Dangerous Space Bar - The 2016 Eagle Races

Hey space cadets what is going on? I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the Space Bar. This week we'll be talking about the social highlight of the month... The Eagle Races!

The event was hosted on the NULL discord channel and a lot of fun was had all round. The route took us in a loop around the farseers base on Decait. Simple as the route looks from above, there are more than a couple of hazards to face. Starting with the four bridges at farseers... and ending with the sportsmanlike conduct of the evil eagles dropping mines and missiles.

Aside from some ganking pirates in Frame Shift near the sun, we all made a good arrival. After the first heat, the race was covered by a friendly Corvette who happened by - Nothing like a bit of muscle to make you feel safe during a murder race.

A well done has to be given to Loner Haddock who manages the bridge of death in his Corvette... At a fraction of eagle speed but he still boosted through.

Thankyou, Cmdr Loner Haddock

The Eagle has landed

The eagle races was a great event, and a great chance to talk smack with the jive turkeys from NULL. Despite my affinity for my Orange python, I managed to squeeze into a little eagle, but seemed to be the only pilot opted for "The Blue One" With a variety of racing red, jet black, and sporting stripes showing all round.

Just as varied as the cosmetics was the engineering that went into the racers. Sandpup has specified this was a murder race, and each heat slowly dissolved into a free for all where the last man standing became more important than the first across the finish line. This makes the choice of shields and hardpoints

I went for a "stock" Class-A Eagle, with sub-spec class-Ds in every slot I didn't need, like FSD. Every component was picked for low-mass high-speed... and then I added shields and hardpoints.
My hardpoints of choice was missiles, because I knew I wouldn't have the fastest thrusters on the grid so there should always be a ready target in view - and if there wasn't, I was winning. Three missile impacts can really ruin your day in an eagle and it was a good pick, but eagles are hard to hit.

If it was an Eagle speedway, obviously I'd lose the hardpoints and consider Bi-Weave shields. You are likely to hit the canyon walls a little and having that faster regen may well be better than having the higher strength. I feel my Shield Cell Bank was wasted ... It's a lightweight component but you really have to have your wits about you to pop a shield in a canyon murder race. There was talk of running shieldless - the insurance companies must love us.

Discussions were had on dirty-drive vs clean, which maybe make more of a difference on the speedway then the murder race. Being able to outrun your opponent helps, but staying alive is tip-top important and I found myself taking heat damage on a couple of occasions without the drive tuning.

Whether you were there for the racing, the murderising, or the comradeship, the Evil Eagle murder race had something for everybody - even a little bit of chase-the-SRV action going on while we were waiting for network instancing to sort out.

This is commander TwingTwang signing out from a night well spent at the NULL Evil Eagle Murder races! Whats the fastest ship you've flown and where do you stand on the Shields+Guns or lightweight+fast scale?

Fly Casual Everybody.

Elite Dangerous Outfitters - The Mighty Python

Hey space cadets what is going on?
I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the outfitters

In this article we'll be talking about the Faulcon Delacy Python. The python is an often overlooked ship that I think you can have a lot of fun with.

Full disclosure here: I've pretty much ignored the python until now and dismissed it as not having a well defined role but after putting in the flight hours over the past few weeks I've got to say the python is more of a luxury cobra than a budget anaconda.

The fly-off-the-forecourt Class-E python isn't much to write home about, but no ship is until you really make it your own. Like any of my builds, I wanted a slimline refit to get a good jump range before I equip and engineer so after flying around outside the station to get the feel of it I went for the all-round Class-D with the A-Rated FSD.
This slimline refit is usually a good starting point for a build but for the Python it's worth going into a bit more detail because you have options.

Power
The 7D power plant gives out 22.5MW and weighs in at 32T. Replace this with a cheeky 6A which provides slightly more power at 25.0 MW, weighs only 20T and has better heat effeciency. OK, so the 6A is going to cost you 16MCr but it's a good base if you can keep the power draw down. The class-A heat efficiency is strongly recommended and the 6A is a lot cheaper than the 7A if you are buying your first python.

You can't quite pull the same trick with the Distributor - the 6A is better then the 7D but does add 8T to your weight and you have to choose what you pay for so you have to choose where to compromise. If its just jump range you need, then stick with the 7D, which was my starting point until I'd flown for a while and gotten used to the ship - more on that later but this is a component I upgraded fairly quickly.

Keep it slim
I actually didn't mind the 6D thrusters when I started flying, so I kept D-Ratings on everything else except the FSD, which is obviously the 5A and will give you a jump range in the 18-19 LY range depending on what else you fit.

First Impressions
When I first took the Python out for a spin, I maxed it at 212T of cargo space and flew it as a "Tons & Guns" delivery truck doing missions and flying a gold run without fear of interdiction.
I used the Python for the Tutumu Community goal - hauling 200+ of Gold hundreds of light years out, and it earned me 20M credits in no time at all as a long-distance freighter. As my flight time increased, I got more and more drawn to missions and pretty much stopped trading. So it didn't take me long to go back to the outfitters and start pimping my python.

Four 0A Shield boosters is a good start, but what I've found is my shields hold out for a while but my hull is getting torn open in seconds so - and hold your breath - I'm strongly advising military composites on the Python. It's not so bad in a wing, but when you are flying solo things can go South quickly. The problem really is how crazy strong the shields are compared to the hull, usually when my shields dropped I knew it was going to be an insurance payout.
Military composites cost a cool 50M on the Python - it's not a cheap ride compared to all the flight time I've put into space superiority starfighters, but the extra durability feels like it's needed and at this point I wasn't hauling long distance freight so the extra weight didn't hurt the jump range

As far as hardpoints go, I started with three large burst lasers and two medium multi-cannons. This was a power-draw compromise but not a great choice. Combat against almost any ship became a rhythm of me taking down their shields quickly but not being able to finish the job, so I switched to two medium lasers and three large MCs.
Overall, I found the MCs suit the python a little better than the fraggers that I preferred on the Vulture and Viper builds. They can be on gimbals to make up for the less responsive turning circle, and still do reasonable damage. In the end I replaced one of the MCs for a missile but in general I don't find missiles too reliable because of countermeasures so I don't think I'll be keeping it long term but it was worth trying out. With a bit of tweaking, higher dps short-range burst lasers and MCs with corrosive rounds this is quite a formidable bounty hunter.

Combat encounters are going to upgrade you to the big 7A power couplings, and I'd recommend these right off the bat if you can afford them. I didn't feel the thruster upgrades made a huge difference until I'd flown it around for a while, but once I had them I wouldn't go back. You get about 10% more on the turn and ~50m/s more on the boost, but if you are spending the money anyway then it's worth picking them up.

Price it up
And this brings me on to the price. Upgrading the Python feels super expensive, especially if you are used to smaller ships and there is a huge difference between a small ship that you can Class-A for 16M credits and a ship like the Python where each individual component costs 16M. Each. This isn't a ship you should buy on a whim and not something you can knock together cheaply but now I have it ticking over just so its a ship I've got a lot of affection for.
You can outfit a reasonable Python for just under 100M, but will pay a fair amount more once you have that top-tier Class-A refit.

(Image credit: http://elite-dangerous-blog.co.uk/)

Engineering
I'm going to touch on engineering briefly, although this is such a personal topic that I can't really give recommendations - you tweak the way you want to go. Always pay attention to how your ship is performing and use the engineers to nudge it the way you want it.  I AM going to say that loss of accuracy on your hardpoints really annoys me, you should prefer charge rate to capacity on your power couplings and raw dps over large ammo counts. I'm not building a warship to sit in a conflict zone for hours, I'm building a wing fighter with a sting in the tail so that you can seal the deal quickly and collect the bounty.
If you are engineering for jump range, there are plenty of lightweight components and obviously the drive tuning of your choice.
The Python is a good hunter, miner, and mission runner so collecting engineering components isn't going to be that hard for you.

I've had people recommend Pythons specialized mining, and you could easily dedicate a hardpoint and the internal capacity. I think I'd be tempted to have a mining refit, and then switch back to general purpose rather than carrying a little bit of mining gear around all the time but there is space to keep a refinery at hand all the time if you wanted to. For me, just adding a SRV was enough for me to drop planetside and mine some materials for engineering but I can see the attraction of full on mining.

I guess the roundup wouldn't be complete without touching on skimmer missions. They seem on-vogue at the moment. Obviously you can hunt skimmers in a Python and it'll do the job just fine if that's the way you roll. It's overkill for that sort of thing, but a rock solid weapons platform with a good jump range so well suited to the task.

Closing thoughts
Overall the python is super versatile. I started out by saying I'd overlooked it as a poor-mans anaconda and I had low expectations of the ship but it feels like a super luxury cobra. Its a mission runner, it's a trader, its a smoker, it's a midnight joker and it's a space cowboy that I'm looking forward to flying for a long time.
So far it's not come up short in any area - sure the Asp can jump further and the Type Nine carries twice the cargo, but its a similar gunner to the FDL and the Python has been great for running missions, gaining faction rep, collecting engineering components, and I've used it to haul kilotons to Community Goals and put thousands of light years on the clock - and it has done all of that with gusto. 

"The Python cruiser: Freedom in a box from Falcon Delacy" Five stars, would fly again.

This is Delacy "Tango-Whisky-India" signing off, until next time, fly Casual everybody.

Elite Dangerous Pilot Academy - Be a good Wingman

Hey Space Cadets what is going on?
I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the pilot academy.

Today I'll be taking a new slant on a topic as old as the stars - how to be a good wingman and talk about a couple of different roles in the wing. 

First off, the obvious thing about flying in a wing is sticking together. Whether you are in a conflict zone or shipping lane, the wing gives you strength in numbers and we are stronger together. All of us are stronger than any of us.

What follows is a bit of an explanation of the roles I've seen. Somebody asked me why I use these terms in the blog so I think they deserve their own post. In general I think all of the roles are situational, and I rarely fly in a wing where we assign jobs and stick to it. More often we assume a role ad-hoc and it's proven more effective to work as a team.

Stockbroker

Since I've put a couple of hours into the shipping lanes lets talk about the stockbroker. The role here is find good trade runs and plot the route that nets the wing the biggest loot. This is going to be measured in Millions of Credits per hour, which you'll see referred to as MCr/H or sometimes M/H

Your two options are just to state the expected MCr/H figure, or give it in MCr/H per 100T, and let the other commander multiply up for their hold. TBH, your wing is likely to be similar sized large ships so I tend to quote for *my* full hold and let others fly what they will.

You'll have to plot a route that suits your whole wing - some people don't want illegal smuggling, others aren't set up for long-distance rare runs. You need to make sure there are Large landing pads at each stop if your wing needs it.

There is money to be had in Imperial Slaves, but who wants to get into the slave trade?

If you want to be a good stockbroker, have a trade run in mind and make sure the money is good.
If you want to be a good freighter commander, whether you are the stockbroker or not, ALWAYS have good shields and max out on shield boosters, and the biggest FSD you can afford. Nobody wants to put up with your 9LY jump range - you'll spend the whole evening in hyperspace.

Other outfitting advice - your CAG might ask that you have full hardpoints. Even a Type-Nine war cow can be fitted with cannons or missiles and be ready to unload as soon as the shields go down.

Your stockbroker will also be the guy who plots out community goals. At the time of writing, the Tutumu community goal just finished and that was an easy 10 or 20 MCr for anybody who flew out there. Being able to direct commanders to local ports with a supply of cargo comes with the territory.

In general terms, trade wings are a good way to go and a relaxed atmosphere to sit back and talk turkey while you fly in a straight line for money. The profits aren't astronomical but its a social way to play.

Executive officer (XO)

The XO is the next role we'll talk about. It's the XOs job to coordinate the wing when they are in flight. Often the XO and the stockbroker is the same ship, but it's usually easiest to have the ship with the shortest jump range to be the XO but anybody can do it if you pay attention.

If you don't have an XO, the wing can rely on wingman nav-lock to jump in convoy but TBH this is pretty terrible and you waste a fair amount of time. A good XO will act as a navigator, coordinating with the stockbroker and plot a route and call out the jumps, making sure there are fuel stops if required. Second to this, a good XO go through the jump checklist and make sure all ships have reported in:

• Launch
• Out of mass-lock
• Throttle to zero
• FSD fully charged
• Aligned with destination

Once everybody has reported in, the XO will call the jump and everybody can throttle up boost at the same time. This jumps you all at the same time and you'll arrive at the destination system together, with an excellent chance of seeing each other on your scopes.

If you want to be a good XO, make sure everybody is ready to jump and can jump together. If you are in a fighter wing heading out to a conflict, you can be more lenient and meeting at the destination is most important. If you are coordinating a trade wing, then keep everybody together as much as you can.

Captain of the Air Group (CAG)

While the XO is in charge of coordinating the fleet, it's the CAG who takes over when the fur starts flying. The CAG should call the shots in a conflict zone or interdiction, coordinating focus fire on hostile targets.

Your CAG might be the same person as your XO, but doesn't have to be. Like any of the roles you can ad-hoc decide on somebody to listen to, or you can arrange in advance how you are going to play.

Since we tend to XO from the biggest trading vessel, it'll be the strongest fighter who calls the shots in combat. If your crew are four anacondas, well, you can kind of pick and choose who does what but having a chain of command that allows you to focus fire a single target so I'd still recommend it.

A good CAG pays attention to their radar and checks the Contacts panel for threats. Keep an eye on your wings shields and who needs support - you can bait and switch to give your wing buddy time to rebuild his shields.

If you are flying with traders, let them know if they should boost away from a fight to stay safe or retreat back and have missiles ready. 

It's also the CAG who will call fight or flight. Keep a level head, understand the odds and know if this is a fight you can win. Better to jump out and repair than having insurance payouts. Be aware of the cash investment of your wing - if people are flying their primary ship they will be more risk averse. If they are taking a weekend Viper out for a spin then they might not mind a few scrapes and are happy to fight to the death.

Admiral

Usually a single wing won't have an admiral, but if you are coordinating multiple wings then you want to know who is who. The admiral will talk to each wing leader and make sure each wing knows what the other is doing.

This can be as simple as an additional push-to-talk comms channel, so that the wing leader can choose to talk to his own wing or in the Wing-leaders channel.

The admiral shouldn't be pushy - don't let the title go to your head. You should be coordinating wings, not ordering them around or sending them to die. When the CAG of one wing says they are jumping out from a conflict zone to repair/restock then just let the others know.
If one wing drops to an interdiction on a trade run then let the other wings know - you don't have to order them to drop from supercruise and assist. 

The exact mechanics of your chain of command are up to you - these are just recommendations from an old dog and I'd love to hear the new tricks you've come up with.

That was Pilot Academy and this is Cmdr TwingTwang signing out.

Elite Dangerous Pilot Academy - When Vultures Fail

Hey Space Cadets what is going on?
I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the outfitters.

Today we'll be talking about the Vulture again. Again.  

The Vulture is a space superiority starfighter that caught my eye from the day it was released. You can pick up an empty Vully for a cool five mill, and you'll spend ten to fifteen on top of that before you are ready to fly.

My first impressions of the Vulture were really good but I had super trouble balancing the power management. That little 4A Power Plant gives you 15.6MW, which should be plenty but you have to make a lot of compromises to make it work.
I found myself flying with one laser and one cannon - Personally I've always liked the Fraggers - which has a lower power draw but its limited ammo doesn't have the staying power if you wanted to sit in a conflict zone for hours.

In my Vulture first impressions, I recommended 3E Gimbal Pulse lasers which are good overall and in my revisited article I've already talked about power management and hardpoint options. I've settled on the Class-B thrusters and dual gimbal Pulse lasers and added the Military Grade Composite as standard. Partly because I have a little more cash for this sort of build now, but also because my hull was being chewed up quickly once the shields went down.

I'll put links to the old articles at the end and won't labour over the outfitting. here. For reference, I think this is the Vully that I'm launching with these days. 99% sure all the details are right but this isn't an outfitting article.

https://coriolis.io/outfit/vulture/2patgFalddksif31e1e0404070h4a032o--.Iw19kA==.IwBhrTIig===

Right - preamble out of the way - on to the heart of the matter.
The Vulture has served me well for simple one-on-ones, against those bigger ships it takes a while to bring them down but you can turn on a dime and just keep chipping away. However, it failed me in a convoy. I was in a trade wing of Lakon-9's hauling kilotons of gold and had switched to the Vulture to run fighter escort. It was a follow-the-leader convoy and I was Nav-Locked to the ship in front of me - should be a routine mission and if anybody interdicts a Lakon-9 they will find themselves facing the full fury of a Vulture as I light them up.

But the problem with Nav locked jumps is there is a quite a delay (compared to having an XO call the jumps and everybody engages at the same time) So the Niner that jumped in first was a distance from me before I arrived, and when the interdiction was called he wasn't on my radar.  At this point, all you can do is follow the shipping lane and wait for the wing beacon so you can jump in.
To cut the story there, I did manage to jump in, but the Niner had taken too much damage and even as I drained my weapon banks, the ship I was supposed to be protecting opened up like space tuna and shed its glittering cargo everywhere.
Now, I was paid to protect the convoy and I just cost them I dunno five or ten million? by not being able to act in time. On the plus side, I scored revenge and earned 120K from the bounty but my good fortune somehow didn't console the freighter captain that had lost out.

And this is where the Vulture fails. It wasn't the delicate power balance, or the shield configuration. I hadn't launched with the wrong loadout or equipped the wrong hardpoints. It was the game that surrounds the game that mattered. I've replayed the encounter a hundred times in my head. I could have jumped sooner - I could have bought a Class-A sensor, maybe that would have got me in faster.
Was this a task that just wasn't suited to the Vulture? It felt like escort duty was ideally suited to a Vulture - almost guaranteed one-on-one fights, against a distracted opponent, backed up by the five turret cannons of a fat niner. Surely this should be easy pickings? Food for thought.

So on to the lesson learned. If you are flying a combat sortie, then own that mission. If you are flying escort then you are the CAG. If there is anything that compromises the safety of your mission then you are the authority. The wing might plot the route, but you are in charge of security, keep the wing together.

Bringing this round to the title - when do Vultures fail? When they aren't being vultures. Fly like a vulture, fight like a vulture, find the right role for your playing style, and bring home the bacon.

This is Cmdr TwingTwang signing off. What have you been flying lately and how has your play style changed since you started?

References:
My first impressions outfitting article.
http://spaceplaneblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/elite-dangerous-outfitters-vulture.html

And my revisited thoughts after flying it a little while.
http://spaceplaneblog.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/elite-dangerous-outfitters-vulture.html

Elite Dangerous Space Bar - Economic Armaments

Hey space cadets what is going on?
I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the space bar.

This is just a quick update about the Economic Armaments community goal at Hamilton Gateway that has been lighting up Galnet.

At the time of writing, the goal has just passed Tier Two and the rewards are starting to rack up, with a 3% Diamondback discount already waiting for me there is every incentive to keep farming the metals and bringing home the bacon.

As the Community Goal is still relatively new, it was very quick to get up into the top 15% but as the tiers progress it'll take some serious trading to hang in there ... but I don't see this goal lasting a full nine more days from today and a second trading session should be enough to get a foothold in the higher reward brackets.

The sporty looking diamondback is the latest offering from Lakon Spaceways, and is set to be a fine addition to any pilots collection. Speculation is running wild - I'm hoping for a mid sized blockade runner in the fifty million range with enough hardpoints for it to be taken seriously.
I talked about building a blockade runner from a Lakon Sixer in my Lakon Type-6 outfitters article, and I really like the idea of a dedicated multipurpose ship - kind of like a big brother to the Asp.

Are you a fan of community goals? Is the look of the new diamondback enough to capture your interest or do you have another ship in mind?  Is a 3% discount enough to make you join in? How much would it take?

I've been Cmdr TwingTwang, reporting from Hamilton Gateway in Wolf 406 where things are heating up. Fly Casual, pilots.

Elite Dangerous Outfitters - Vulture Revisited

Hey Space Cadets what is going on?
I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the outfitters.

Today we'll be talking about the Vulture again. The Vulture is a space superiority starfighter that offers great performance and manoeuvrability.  Ballparking at around twenty million credits once equipped the Vulture also boasts incredible value for money in combat providing unparalleled bang for the buck.

In my first Vulture Outfitters article I gave my first impressions of the ship and  I had time to return to the vulture after a long time flying other ships and I've got to say I'm still impressed. The vulture turns on a dime, and while it's not super fast on the straight it is no slouch when it comes to holding position in combat. Most recently I've also been flying a sidewinder and a lot of the lessons I learned in the Vulture helped me in the sidewinder, and vice-versa.

General Loadout
I'm going to assume at this point that you have a Vulture to hand and enough money to fit Class-A Power Plant, Distributor, Thrusters and Shields.  My sensors and life support are D to save power and the Frame Shift is in power group 2, so inactive during combat.

This means you should look something like this before you start outfitting:

BH: 1I Lightweight Alloy
RB: 4A Power Plant
TM: 5A Thrusters
FH: 4A Frame Shift Drive
EC: 3D Life Support
PC: 5A Power Distributor
SS: 4D Sensors
FS: 3C Fuel Tank (Capacity: 8)

That build is going to total just under fifteen million, and leave you plenty of spending money for shields, weapons and toys.

Power Management
Like the viper - or any other fighter - the Vulture is really limited by its power plant. Even the 4A only gives you 15.6 MW to play with so you have to balance your priorities carefully but since your FSD can safely power down when the hardpoints deploy you can use the full 15.6 on your combat loadout. It only saves you an extra 0.45 but every little helps.

This Vulture build was designed with some of the community goal conflict zones in mind, so I've chosen a Class-D Life Support that runs all the time, instead of a Class-A that gets shut off when the hardpoints deploy.  An escort fighter can deal with the short flight time caused by the life support cutting out but a warship needs to stay in the fight a lot longer.

Hard choices in hard points
In my previous vulture outfits, I've been using paired C3 Gimbal Beams, dual E3 Gimbal Burst and dual E3 Gimbal Pulse Lasers.  Going back to the sidewinder has taught me to fly with fixed lasers again, and after trying several loadouts I flew my sidewinder with a fixed beam and gimbal cannon and had a lot of success with that combo.  The fixed beam allows you to track your target and ignore chaff, and the cannon allows you to start really tearing into the hull once the shields go down.

The dual gimbal burst lasers I used before are a quality compromise, and don't have the punch of the beams but only draw 1.65MW each - still a massive 3.3MW energy budget for weapons.

Dual C3 Gimbal Beams are only a fraction higher at 3.56MW, but drain the banks faster and overheat more readily.  In a long fight, your overheating beams will cut out and reduce your damage output so it might be that the lower rated burst lasers actually fare better. In addition, you'll have to reduce your shields or thrusters to find the power to run them.

The higher damage per second means the C3 Fixed beams cost a fraction more energy, and since the Vulture has no trouble staying on target they are a good contender, however having at least one gimbal really helps you target submodules for power plant takedowns so I've moved to asymmetric options.

The next option is the high power Beam+Plasma option. Costing 3.75MW it's not much more expensive than dual beams, and really does the damage. I found that heat problems upset me here, and while I dished out a lot of damage I also took quite a lashing as I had to use a lower-grade shield. Overall I didn't feel as comfortable using plasma - smaller targets were literally hit or miss, too often miss... Meanwhile against bigger ships like anacondas I found the my ship got super hot, and thermal overload shut down both weapons leaving me sitting duck in my reduced power shields.

Flying the vulture with a C3 Gimbal Beam and a C3 Gimbal Cannon worked out really well for me, and it's a tough call to say if I preferred it to dual burst lasers. Your beam laser is slower at slicing through shields, but the gimbal really helps it lock on to ship modules and get power-plants quickly too. The Gimbal Cannon is great at wrecking hulls, and can try to target modules too. This combo takes only 2.53MW which is a huge advantage and saves you an extra MW to for other systems.

I found the gimbal frag cannon pretty good too. Its damage output at point blank range is scary good and its at that range you can afford the fixed-forward, which I think uses a lot less power. The gimbal cannon felt like it hit ship submodules, while the fragger doesn't really do anything that precise. Again this is a fairly low power combo at 2.8MW but I think I just preferred the straight cannon on the Vulture.

A note on the Gimbal beam is that it can struggle to track, especially against chaffing cobras. Just untarget the ship and it'll revert to fixed-forward, allowing you to line up your shot and keep dealing damage until the chaff expires.  I found the cannon doesn't suffer from this so much, as you will only shoot when you have a clear line of fire and by the time you open up the cannon your quarry will often have burned through their chaff. You can often just wait for the chaff to expire too, and use the chance to refill your laser banks and let your smoking guns cool down.

Lastly, if you are building an escort fighter or bounty hunter for a wing then a Class-A life support that powers down when the hardpoints deploy should be fine as you'll be returning to the station to collect the bounty anyway.  In a ship like this, I'l might pick the fragger instead of the cannon, as you will have time to reload and want to maximise your damage per second.

Thrusters
Soaking up a massive 6MW, the 5A thrusters eat your energy budget for breakfast and while you can save about 0.5MW for each grade you drop down I didn't fare as well with 5B thrusters so wasn't encouraged to fly with the 5Cs. It may be a placebo effect, and I've not done any serious instrumentation on their performance but even with the smidgeon of extra power you can throw into weapons or shields I found that Manoeuvring with the 5A was just that much better, so I'm going to keep recommending them.
I tend to divert power to engines to top the capacitor ready for a boost but rarely fly with more than one pip in engines, better power management helps.

I'd be interested in doing some instrumented tests on the difference between the 5B and 5A thrusters, because if the difference is slight, then the extra power may be better used elsewhere, but I ~felt~ better with the 5A which is all I've got to go on so far.

Shield Options
One trick I developed from flying a sidewinder recently is that you can afford to have an extra shield booster (or two) in power group 2. They will be powered down when your guns are out but you can stow your hardpoints and get an extra 20% shields strength (or more). This is super useful if you are trying to get out of the line of fire, or if you know you won't need to shoot for five seconds.

I tried a build without Shield Banks, which is a difficult decision.  In the vulture I'm rarely getting tagged so their main use is to increase your income by staying in the fight non-stop.  However I'm not flying the Vulture for the income, so don't mind holding my position for a minute and letting the shields restore before I get back into the fray. If you are a big PVP player, then you'll have more use for the shield bank, but I'll leave that discussion for another day. If you do want it, then add your shield bank into power group 2 or 3 as you won't have the juice for it during combat.

This leaves me with a 5A Shield bank and three Class-B Shield Boosters. One used the extra MW I freed up from my hardpoints and two of the boosters are in the secondary power group so don't activate during combat, but thats OK.  I found that with the weapons overheating I had to take breaks and anecdotally stowing the hardpoints helps them cool down so I was putting my guns away even for a five second break between ships and getting the benefit from the extra protection too.

For the technically minded, (or those on a budget) the Class-5C shield generator with a Class-B shield booster gives you better protection than a Class-A shield on its own, for a smidgeon less power consumption and about a tenth the purchase price. (600K instead of 5M Credits) I had to do a lot of value-for-money comparisons building a sidewinder on a budget, and a lot of lessons like this transfer across to the larger ships.  Your real currency is the power consumption in the vulture, not the purchase price, but it's a point of interest nonetheless.

The last note on shields, is that I'm probably being over protective here.  The shields on my vulture hardly ever get taken down, and while that could be attributed to the extra shield booster, the nimble turning circle of the ship does a lot of work for you. Its just as viable to put less energy into the shields if you do want to run two high energy weapons however every now and then you get sandwiched between two anacondas and the extra shields really pay off.

Closing thoughts
Overall, my Vulture build came to about 23M Credits so the insurance is a little over a million and I had a few million in the bank for insurance so wasn't much worried about wrecking a few in combat trying out different loadouts. A Vulture on a Budget can be had from about 16.5M by fitting Class-B Thrusters and Shields, and the insurance there is going to be a little over 850K, but the ship isn't quite as strong.

It's a competent ship with plenty of options but I found the biggest problem was those overheating lasers. Beam and Cannon was the most fun, and didn't drain the banks as much as the dual laser combinations, so I'm going to keep those for a while.

I've not talked about colours yet ... I'm flying mine orange to match the Orion Arm Privateers who I'm flying with these days but I'm really coming round to the look of the blue vulture. Which scheme do you think looks best? Which paint style from another ship would you like to see on the vulture?

I hope these thoughts on the Vulture help you get the most from your ship.  Coming back to the vulture after flying small ships again has really given me a fresh perspective on it. What has been your favourite loadout - are you a beams or a burst pilot?

Elite Dangerous Outfitters - Lakon Type 9 Transport.

Hey space cadets what is going on?
I'm Cmdr TwingTwang and welcome to the outfitters

In this article we'll be talking about the Lakon Type Nine Transport, while I've written a little about the smaller ships I realised I've neglected the big ole Fat-9 for outfitting.

As a first-time buyer, trading up to the Fat9 represents a huge investment in time and money compared to the T7 or Python a lot of people come from. Firstly you will have saved up the 76M purchase price, which its difficult to do by accident, and secondly you will be buying the ultimate space truck from Lakon and the only vessel - at time of writing - that breaks the five-hundred tonne capacity so its understandable you want to get the most out of the ship.

The shop floor Fat9 is a snap at 76M Credits, getting you a 220T ship with a 6.62 to 7.71 Light Year range but before you fly it off the forecourt with those specs we're going to take a while now and talk about the minimum practical configuration for a money-making Fat9.

Jump Range
If you are a dedicated space trucker, you'll have your favorite route that maximises your Cr/H profit in your smaller ship. The same route might not work so well with the reduced jump range of a Type-9 if it takes several additional jumps to get from end to end, which is going to take time and cut into your profits.
Before buying the big ole beast, you need to have a profitable route ready to go - it'll be super annoying if you bought the ship and then had to search for a route. Thankfully you can easily buy a disposable sidewinder for 32K at one end of your route and equip it for a similar jump range to the Fat9. Browse the galaxy map with this ship and see what the routes look like.  You are after the highest profit route with the fewest jumps, which might result in a different journey to your regular route.

The minimum configuration Fat9 is going to have a Class-E Frame Shift Drive.  Don't upgrade this unless it reduces the number of jumps in your route - for example I needed to make an 11.4LY jump, which meant the Class-E,D,C,B drives fell short and only the A could make it.  There was no reason to buy anything in the middle and I upgraded straight from the E to the A when I could afford it. Likewise, you should buy the smallest you need for your route - we'll talk about how to spend if you are flush with cash later.

Capacity
On the first day that you buy a Fat9, you should increase the internal capacity as high as you want to go but as long as its higher than your previous ship then you are set to make money faster so the purchase was worth it.

I'm going to talk about the three real options here:

1. Defended Size-6 shields and 468T of cargo
2. Reccomended Size-5 shields and 500T of cargo
3. Baremetal with 532T of cargo

Defended Build
The defended build makes a lot of sense. The 6A shields give you about 29% more protection than the 5A option, and will keep you safer for longer while you make the jump to supercruise and escape from trouble.
The downside here is that the 6A shields cost sixteen million credits and they cost you 64T of cargo space - which equates to a net loss of about half a million credits per hour compared to the baremetal 532T option.
The Defended Build is ONLY worth it if you are spending the extra million on shield boosters.  Four Class-A shield boosters will cost under 1.2M Credits and make the world of difference - the 6A by itself has little value, as you could afford a 5A with boosters for a third the price and get better protection.

Recommend Build
The pilots choice award goes to the best size five shields you can afford. I actually did my first run with a 372T capacity using Size-5 shields as I didn't quite have enough money for the full cargo hold plus insurance so my Internal compartments looked like this:

8: 7E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 128)
7: 7E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 128)
6: 6E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 64)
5: 5E Shield Generator
4: 4E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 16)
4: 4E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 16)
3: 3E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 8)
3: 3E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 8)
2: 2E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 4)

As you can see, the 5E shields are a cheap starting point, and the 7E cargo rack in the Size-8 Compartment is at least enough to get you flying and makes more profit than than any of the smaller ships.
The 5A shield with a cheap 280K Shield booster will give about the same protection as a 6A shield, and only cost a fraction of the price.  Keep adding those Shield Boosters - you can afford them very quickly with a big earner like this.

Barmetal Build
If you don't have shields, you can fit a 532 tonnes of cargo into the Fat9. And I played like this for a while to benefit from the extra income it provides over the 500T build with shields.

I ran the numbers and while you can take a few bumps and scrapes docking and launching, the extra profits cover this so 532 Tonnes make more money than 500T even paying for small repairs. Its only earning an extra quarter of a million an hour than a shielded ship so you have to be really pinching the pennies and in a hurry for cash to run this ship.

In all honesty, and having done both, I'm going to recommend the 500T with shields build over the baremetal option. While the occasional docking scrape costs you less than the extra profit you make, you only have to get tagged once and you have a five-million credit insurance payout to cover.

Internal Components
Since the Class-A FSD costs fifteen million credits, it's worth doing everything else you can to decrease your tonnage and increase your range. So I'm going to recommend a Class-D refit across the board. This isn't super needed, but I do recommend it. It's possible that a smaller FSD will suit you, and I'll leave that you your trading and planning skills.

Its worth mentioning that the 5A power plant costs five million - ten times as much as the 6D but has more power, excellent heat efficiency, and weighs less. Its a good choice for a Fat9 freighter and has enough power for 5A shields and four Class-A shield boosters too.

A reasonable Type-9 Lakon starts leaves you with a 500T capacity is going to increase your purchase price to about 108 Million Credits providing a 12.8 - 18.1 Ly range. The full loadout starts to look like this:

M: 1F/F Pulse Laser
M: 1F/F Pulse Laser
U: 0A Shield Booster
U: 0A Shield Booster
U: 0A Shield Booster
U: 0A Shield Booster

BH: 1I Lightweight Alloy
RB: 5A Power Plant
TM: 7D Thrusters
FH: 6A Frame Shift Drive
EC: 5D Life Support
PC: 6D Power Distributor
SS: 4D Sensors
FS: 6C Fuel Tank (Capacity: 64)

8: 8E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 256)
7: 7E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 128)
6: 6E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 64)
5: 5A Shield Generator
4: 4E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 16)
4: 4E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 16)
3: 3E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 8)
3: 3E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 8)
2: 2E Cargo Rack (Capacity: 4)

For the tweakers, you can drop the laser pointers, or replace them with a combination of chaff, mines, or turrets.  I've tried most combos, and generally once you are shielded and can jump to FSD your hardpoints aren't that significant.  Chaff and Mines are strongly recommended, although I have turret cannons on all five of my hardpoints just for the fun of being able to fire cannons.

This 108 Million build isn't the minimum profitable Fat9, but its a reasonably cheap build that maximises the ship well.  On top of the purchase you want about eleven million for twice the insurance and about the same again for cargo if you are shifting something costly like palladium so you need about a hundred and thirty million credits in assets before you take the plunge.

You can drop the shields, and FSD range to build a budget Fat9 and reduce your overheads to about 85M. You'll need the same twenty million on top of the to fly the ship, so the entry level for the ship is about 105M Cr. I really wouldn't recommend investing in a type nine with a penny less.

War Cow
For a few extra credits one could fit turrets in all the hardpoints and fill the ship with shields and shield banks. Its not graceful, nor does it pack a punch, but it's a fun and quirky way to rack up a couple of bounties - as long as you have a wingman or three to help you out before it gets too hot.

I have turret cannons on my Fat9 because I love the feeling of cannons. They never get fired except for fun, but a mix of fraggers and beams would add a little playful punch to this build and you could protect yourself against the riff raff, even in a combat zone.  Meanwhile you can always ram another ship and generally come out on top. Top-Tip... Fixed-Forward plasma helps soften up hulls as you approach them at ramming speed.

Closing thoughts
Lastly, it has to be said that the Lakon Spaceways Type Nine transport is a great earner. It'll net you 5M Cr/H trading local routes, and push 6 or 7 million if you have good nav locked jumps too. You won't get this from a smaller ship and this is one of the fastest ways to earn some spending cash. Other pilots will be happy to fly on your wing, as the trade bonds are a good enough incentive.

Outfitting the Fat9 isn't as tough as a space superiority starfighter, and you can pretty much have any configuration you want as long as you've got the cash available - and if you don't its a fast way to earn. For the most part its possible to buy a minimum configuration ship and trade up for the other bits you want.

That said it is an expensive ship to fly and you have to commit to a significant price tag, but the increased profits reduce the time you spend trading. This means you can spend time flying missions, and being a general space cowboy in your other ships.  For me this ship is a money-making enabler and a solid way to fund my gameplay, and I quickly hop back into the cockpit every week or two to grab an extra five or ten million to buy a shiny thing that has caught my eye.

Do you have any experiences flying the Fat9?  Are you about to trade up from a smaller ship and want some advice, or have a perspective from the other side as an anaconda pilot?
If you have any thoughts about the Fat9 then leave a comment, if there is an outfitters article or particular ship or build you'd like to hear about then let me know.

Keep on space trucking, and fly casual everybody.