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Post T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
I'm in the process of transitioning from a Wing 5 to a DS or Vulture and I'm in need of some advice on setups & tactics for my less-nooby ship. I'm pretty poor, so I've been looking at the lower end of T 20 equipment, unless someone has a spare panther. (I'll love you forever)

From what I've seen & heard, the common approach to a T 20 SD is a fast sniper, staying out of ai range and holding down Spacebar. A basic setup would be:

Vulture (would a DS work?)
V mag or Merc Mag
OL6
Zeus (+) x 2
SD Mastery x 2

The above build is relatively inexpensive, and can handle most ai, but the DPS might be a little low (2.6k), and an actual sniper might be more effective.

I've also been playing with the idea of a Seer-Demon (heh), low vis, good crits:

Death Striker
Decent fast shield w/ charger
(Not sure about the weap, maybe ZHT)
Silent Death OL (built-in)
Arsonist Aug
Hades Aug
SD Mastery
Zeus (+)


I was thinking about a SD that gets close while cloaked, fires a short, high DPS burst (5.5k for 3.5 sec) and is out of range again before taking too much damage. Probably wouldn't work too well against packs of ai / DGs.

What are your thoughts? Am I doing something horribly wrong? Are there any other common builds that I'm unaware of?

tl;dr how should I set-up a SD to be less of a noob?


Thu Mar 29, 2012 4:08 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
For a cheap SD build, try this:

Vulture
Greener
SDMast
Sup Combi
Qa
OS6

Edit: also, I consider Zeus (+) augs useless. In most cases it can easily be exchanged with a Greener Aug (which is worth no more than 128m if you have the 2 Green augs and the bp).

If you're going for a low vis DS with good regen, try Ares+, Qa, Hades, SDMast. It'll have low range, but pretty good burst damage.

However, a favorite DS build of mine that costs about 10b is: Alby, Greener, SDMast, Sup Combi. With a DTS+ you can get fought 60k shields if my memory serves me well and incredible amounts of range.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 4:22 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
In my opinion, SD is played properly using Excommunicator, not mags. It's more DPS and a much more effective damage type (mining) than energy against most DG AI. It does take more attention since you're fighting at closer range, but that's part of the fun.

DS
Zeus+, 2 SD Mast, Albatross
Excommunicator
[Love Cylinder / Uu Quu / Reach of Prometheus] (optional)
Protection of Tobal
Broodmother's Squeaks / Crystalline Pulsations / Forge of the Gods
Grape Influence
Constable's Tractor (helps a lot to keep AI interested)

This setup is better than 2 Z+ 2 Mast because you'll have enough shield bank to tank a few stray shots. Albatross aug and piracy 20 no longer cost that much, either. You can use Sup Combi instead of SD Mast if you really want a bit more range; at any rate it should be a priority to invest in both Dogfighting and Zen of Far Reaching, balancing the negative range as you go. Don't skip Dogfighting completely or your DPS will be crap.

I think you will end up ragequitting if you put any effort into stealthy SD for PvAI, especially at your relatively low level. Most of the good gear for SD in that regime is high vis, so you'll be gimping yourself from the start. Then you'll realize that a lot of AI have very good radar, and a lot of DGs have high vis suns, and you'll really start to rage. Don't forget that you can't use ZHT on a light fighter.

Arsonist's aug is a very interesting one, but I don't think it would suit SD very well. SD Mast is already quite nice for powering and will give you the much needed boost to hull. Also, crit chance is not an extremely effective bonus for SD.

--

Additional remarks:
Zeus+ is very important if you use an elec-hungry weapon like Excomm. Greener will just not give you the ability to sustain DPS for long.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 4:41 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
What exact budget is are you working on Cuddles? Most players can't afford a ~10b setup on their first ship.

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Last edited by Griffin on Thu Mar 29, 2012 4:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Thu Mar 29, 2012 4:47 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
The cost of the setup I put down is pretty minimal, probably around the cost of the DS itself. It was the first T20 setup I used, certainly, and that was on my first ever character.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 4:54 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
Thanks for the responses, I now have a much better idea of what a well designed setup looks like.

Regarding my budget for this ship; I don't really have a fixed amount in mind. At the moment I have a vulture built, and the DS under construction (10 more days!), though I'm close to broke, maybe 2b in the bank, as a result. I do have a bunch of stuff I've been too lazy to sell (maybe 4b worth) and I have some of the equipment mentioned here (Excomm, RoP), and I have access to some of the augs. Other components, like a decent shield, I'm going to need to buy. Oh well, c'est la vie.

I plugged the DS builds into the ship builder with the augs y'all recommended and some of the gear I currently have. (see below)

Griffin's Greener DS Setup:
Image
This build seems like it would produce great burst damage for hit and runs or long range shooting., but the really high RoF would make balanced energy really difficult. I'm guessing that this setup would need a much larger energy bank than my current one to function properly.


anilv's Z+ DS Setup:
Image
This build seems to fit my current play style pretty well. I prefer medium range combat to long range sniping, and this build is close to energy neutral with my current gear. I'm assembling the parts for a Crystalline Pulsations atm, and once that's done I can throw on a bigger gun.

I looked through the wiki and you're totally right about how difficult a low vis SD would be. I had a sneaky ship much earlier (Wing 3 maybe?) and I abandoned it after a long period of being killed by everything. Also, thanks for pointing me towards the Zen skills, I had assumed they were another SP sink like the Control skills. Now I can start to level Dogfighting, which I've been avoiding for range reasons.

I've got one follow-up question regarding ship builds: I've been prioritizing regen (energy and shield) over bank, and I think that decision is responsible for a lot of the issues I have in DGs (insta-death). Are energy neutral builds worthwhile to pursue, or should I be looking for bursts of DPS with charging time in between?


Thu Mar 29, 2012 9:07 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
For a long time I concentrated on shield bank on my SD. I get about 55k on my current setup using Demented Titan Shield+. I found that it's important to have that kind of bank if you are fighting Green Battleships and Omega Platforms. However, I have to carry shield salvations around by the dozen and pop them after getting hit too much. There's a lot to be said for using a high regen shield like Malfunctionning Qi'Uka (sic), though that's out of your price range.

I absolutely support elec temp and elec over energy bank for SD. The gear dictates this (small energies with good regen and low bank) and they work great with an energy or combi capacitor. If you do it right you'll rarely run on empty at the wrong time.

If you use Excomm you also want to invest in Mining Control, up to 25 if you can. That'll make a very nice difference since you fire so fast and it's got 5 bullets.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 9:23 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
Use the extra space to throw in an Ono Energy Cap 8 if you decide to use my cheap build. It's what I did and it worked wonderfully as your max energy will go up by 15k which will let you power things about 5 times as long. Also note the added agility. You should also try getting a CPulsations.

Also, iirc Control skills were nerfed due to low level PD Zerks. It works on a per shot basis now, not per bullet.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 9:40 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
Griffin wrote:
Also, iirc Control skills were nerfed due to low level PD Zerks. It works on a per shot basis now, not per bullet.


No... where would you even get that idea? PD Zerks were nerfed when they buffed rad resists of a lot of AI.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 11:02 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
MasterCuddles wrote:
Are energy neutral builds worthwhile to pursue, or should I be looking for bursts of DPS with charging time in between?
If you can't break your energy regen, you aren't doing enough DPS. That being said, you do want to power for a decent amount of time.

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Thu Mar 29, 2012 11:07 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
By the way, you can get a PoT for not too much if you do the mission in Hyper to kill Anaconda. It still costs 1.5-2b though. As far as powering goes, I find that more than a 30 second burst is unnecessary for most DGs. You should definitely not try to go for a completely energy-neutral build.

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(DefQon1) use a Rhino reconstruotereatarerer
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(Pasta) I need to figure out how to get rid of this UrQa Suqqa Ukuk
(Bluenoser) Put your finger in your mouth and gag reflex should do the rest


Thu Mar 29, 2012 11:28 pm
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Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
Are you the guy I built the vulture for? My computer is down ATM but is done lol.

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Fri Mar 30, 2012 9:29 pm
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Joined: Tue Jan 31, 2012 6:32 pm
Post Re: T20 SD Setups: Free me from noobdom
Yup. That's me.


Sat Mar 31, 2012 8:57 pm
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