So, after having played this class for a long time, along with having alts as every other class in game, I have came to conclude that too many people, especially lower levels, mistake the Engineer class, and never get to experience what an amazing class it is.

There is a few things that I want to mention in this short guide. The main purpose will be to explain in simple ways how Engineers work, and pointing out where most people go wrong. I am not certain that all my calculations and stats are right, but they should at least give a certain idea of understanding.

So, let me split this up in 3 parts.

What to expect from the class
How to aug your ship
What gear to get, and invest in

Basically, everything I write here is from personal experiences, and one can argue against it or for it, as nothing is set in stone.

1. What to expect from your class

Engineer class is one of the greatest support classes you can ever play. Be it for basebuilding, for supporting your team in runs, or for DGing. It gives allround bonuses, and is often used for storage ships, such as Thatches and Singularity Spheres. They get a lot of hull space due to Support Focus giving a huge hull space bonus to freighter class ships.

Now, a really important thing to point out, is the time and experience it takes to get used to being an Engineer. A very good way to explain it, is by pointing out how long time it takes to get used to taking care of your drones in different situations. Normally, you can expect a negative growth rate when it comes to loosing drones. When you start playing the class, you can expect to loose a lot of drones. It will be expensive, but it will get better in time. It takes long, long time to get used to the wide variety of scenarioes in this game, but one day you can sit down and smile and experience to not having lost a single drone in several weeks, and then the money you spent on drones earlier will start paying off. As to mention, I have lost about 60 Armada Inferno Drones throughout my time as Engineer in Star Sonata. Yet, I can mention, that I have not lost a single Armada Inferno Drone in the last 3 months. When you reach this stage, you can consider yourself an experienced Engineer. So I guess what I am trying to say, is don't give up! If you really wanna get there, then it will be costful, and it will take time, but you will get there eventually, and then it will really pay off.

2. How to aug your ship

As an Engineer, there are a few options for augmenters. Normally, you can devide them into 3 groups:

Non-Engineer Augmenters (Regular Augmenters)
Engineer Augmenters
Drone Master Augmenters

At lower levels, it is normal to not use too many Drone Master Augmenters, as you will experience having a low level of augmenter tweaking, and then it might be smarter to aug your ship with shield augmenters, or resistance augmenters. Important note: Certain low tech drones can tank a ton, use that to your advantage!

Engineer Augmenters are normally used for support setups for group runs, or for Capital Ship Engineers. These are normally featured as Earthforce Dreadnoughts, used to energize other players and boost their enery bank.

Drone Master Augmenters is something that many people misunderstand. Not many Engineers knows what Weighted Combat Bonus is. I am going to assume that this page is updated, but I will confirm that later.

Now, this is a skill that you get through Drone Mastery, which is a skill. Note: The skill also gives more drone slots, at Drone Mastery 1, you can place 4 Temporary Drones(Named "Offensive drones" at the wiki), at level 10 you can place 5, and at level 20 you can place 6, which is a good amount of drones.

But well, the main problem that many players do, is that they don't realize what the augmenters do. Personally I am a fan of the General Operations Augmenters, and now I will show why:

There are 9 features that you can boost on your drones. These are:

Damage - Firing - Tracking
Shield - Recovery - Radar
Energy - Electricity - Range

Offensive Augmenters, will boost the first 3, along with giving you somewhat electrical regen.

Defensive Augmentes, will boost the second 3, along with giving you somewhat shield regen.

Everlasting Augmenters, will boost the third 3, along with giving you somewhat electrical regen.

General Augmenters, will boost all 9 at a lower amount, along with giving you speed and hull space.

At T20, from the different Augmenters gain:

Note: These bonuses are only for your drones and does not apply to your ship!

Defensive Operations Mastery: 30% Radar, 30% Shields, 30% Shield Regen

Offensive Operations Mastery: 20% Damage, 20% Tracking, 20% Firing

Everlasting Operations Mastery: 20% Electrical Regen, 20% Energy Bank, 20% Range

General Operations Mastery: 10% Radar, 10% Shields, 10% Shield Regen, 10% Damage, 10% Firing, 10% Tracking, 10% Electrical Regen, 10% Energy Bank, 10% Range

So, maybe this will explain a bit more about what the actual boosts you get to your drones by equipping the different augmenters.

3. What gear to get, and what to invest in

This could be a long topic, but I am going to split it up a bit. First, a bit about the gear. For gear, mostly everything work, and as long as it suits your needs, then there is no standard on what gear you can use on your engineer. This goes for playing at every single level there is. Both low levels and high levels use different gear and ships, and skill and knowledge is more important than your gear itself.

There are certain things that are worth investing in, tho. The main thing, is Drone Controllers. These are basically drone boosters, and you can only have 1 equipped at a time in your ship. You need 30 x of a type of an Augmenter to turn it into a Drone Controller. Then the Drone Controller will have the same stats as the Augmenter you used, and the bonus(es) will apply to your drones.

Some controllers that are considered "standard":

Electricity
Damage
Firing
Shield

You can also look to invest in:

Range
Recovery
Radar

To use Drone Controllers, you need Astral Injecton, which is fairly easy to get.

Investing in controllers is expensive, but totally worth it. Another vital thing to invest in, is Drone Research. At maxed level, Drone Research 5, your drones will get 50% Shields, 50% Energy and 50% Range. This is a very underestimated skill, but really worth it.

Now, I will not post any setups or lists of gear for new players to follow, but if you have an Engineer that you feel is not working as it should, or that you wish to make one, then maybe this will be of help!

i love this guide.
and from personal experience, my engineer used to be just another class to me, mainly a storage and transport/scouter. then, i molested minilion for cash and revisited it. i upgraded to a rhino, bought about 30 of every drone, new gear/augs etc. i lost those drones in about 2 days. i lost another set in 5 days. another set in a month, now i havent lost a drone since i was drunk and forgot ambush drones have no elec regen and got pounded in c7.
and may i also note, people generally build good controllers to test them. bad idea, take my word for it, go to sup. get a damage range and recovery and thats all you ever need imo. firing occasionally is helpfull, anything else is the kind of thing [radar for example] that youll use in once off situations.

il finish up in saying that when i played over the last year, ive spent 90% of my online time online, when i have perfectly good zerks and shms, sds and seers. its the all round, best class, i can confidently state after playing every class at endgame. its the love of my career, nothing finer then a heph machine engineer.if i had to choose between hm+ engi and prawn snip/zerk id go engi every time.

Yeah. Thats the feeling you get when you reach high-end and all the time you invested in your Engineer starts to pay off. Never give up, is the key word.

Defensive Operations Mastery: 90% Radar, 45% Shields, 30% Shield Regen

Offensive Operations Mastery: 10% Damage, 30% Tracking, 20% Firing

Everlasting Operations Mastery: 20% Electrical Regen, 30% Energy Bank, 20% Range

General Operations Mastery: 30% Radar, 15% Shields, 10% Shield Regen, 5% Damage, 10% Firing, 15% Tracking, 10% Electrical Regen, 15% Energy Bank, 10% Range, and either +- 10% Visibility

you didnt weight them >_>

Sorry, I will weight them next time!

So, the lesson of the day is to not aug with offensive augmenters, and that general rocks?!