Is a Railgun +Beam Corvette possible/viable for PvE?

[ApathicAlpaca]

I am relatively new to the game and so far I've played the classic MC + Pulse Laser combo when fighting.
I am currently saving up for Federal Corvette and would like to try some other weapons for a change. Ideally weapons that have unlimited ammo or are so strong that their limited ammo lasts through many NPCs.
(my aim is to do bounties/bonds in extended battles/CZ)

I see railguns are capped at size 2, so I planned to put heat vent beams on the huge mounts and have the rest as rail guns.
Do you think that's viable?
I have access to *some* engineering (around grade 3 for the most important modules should be possible) but obviously I don't want to invest all those mats (particularly the ones to engineer weapons) if the whole approach is inefficient for PvE.

Railguns are mostly to destroy the power plant, right? Is there an easy way to reach it or some trick how to damage it reliably no matter your position?

How do beam lasers + railgun compare to other setups like CQC frag cannons or such? I am just worried about ammunition, if I have to land on some base after killing just 10 NPCs or so then it'd be nonsense.

Thanks.


PS: One other question without opening new thread just for that: I hear SCB are kinda of a must-have against stronger NPCs (CZ...) but they only for 5 charges, right? And I don't see a synthesis option. How do ppl deal with that? I mean, after you used them you gotta go back, right? :(

[Jeffreyac]

Well, I don't have any railgun experience, but I do have beams on the three class 3 hardpoints on my vette, and can tell you the convergence isn't great. I don't worry about it generally, as I use them mostly to strip shields, but it's hard to get two of the beams to lock on a target, and pretty much impossible to get all 3.

So my first thought with a mostly-rails build was you may have some issues with convergence if you want to fire them all at once. (My second thought would be heat and power, but that's another discussion...)

[CoffeeBean]

Having a kraith mkII with frag cannon Is fun but like rail guns there's not much ammo and it's a pain having to leave the combat zone to reload the ammo and I don't want to use engineering materials to craft ammo.


If you want your corvette to be efficient in a combat zone you could use sturdy + plasma slug for your rail guns.

Sturdy reduce thermal load and increase piercing.

Plasma slug reduce dmg (it also reduce thermal load) but you can craft ammo with fuel.

When the shield cell bank are gone it's done, if they're flying shield tank they can retreat and reboot their ship, doing this will bring back the shield to 50% and allow them to continue fighting.

If you're not having much shield to begin with then I guess going back to the station is the only option to avoid damage.

[ApathicAlpaca]

Originally posted by Jeffreyac:

Well, I don't have any railgun experience, but I do have beams on the three class 3 hardpoints on my vette, and can tell you the convergence isn't great. I don't worry about it generally, as I use them mostly to strip shields, but it's hard to get two of the beams to lock on a target, and pretty much impossible to get all 3.

So my first thought with a mostly-rails build was you may have some issues with convergence if you want to fire them all at once. (My second thought would be heat and power, but that's another discussion...)

The hardpoint placement then is not good for beams? Even gimballed? That's a shame :(

Wonder how to get rid of heat then. Heatsinks takes important slots and has only 3 ammo :(

[ApathicAlpaca]

Originally posted by CoffeeBean:

Having a kraith mkII with frag cannon Is fun but like rail guns there's not much ammo and it's a pain having to leave the combat zone to reload the ammo and I don't want to use engineering materials to craft ammo.


If you want your corvette to be efficient in a combat zone you could use sturdy + plasma slug for your rail guns.

Sturdy reduce thermal load and increase piercing.

Plasma slug reduce dmg (it also reduce thermal load) but you can craft ammo with fuel.

Oh that's what Plasma Slug does. Good to know.
Sturdy though... I think 100 pen is already over any armor value NPCs can have so sturdy is kinda useless (except reducing heat). I thought short range maybe, 1km falloff and 2.8 km range is still more than enough.

[ApathicAlpaca]

This was ROUGHLY what I had in mind, kinda... maybe... dunno.
Really need advice if this could work. If heat vent beams have a bad placement on Corvette then I'm screwed I guess. I dont know any other way to get rid of heat quickly without using sinks.

https://coriolis.io/outfit/federal_corvette?code=A0putpFklndzswf50x0x2a2a2a29290404040e00030j044kfh5s1O05m92d-1K32016gC5.Iw18ZVA%3D.Aw18ZVA%3D.H4sIAAAAAAAAA42SoU4DQRRFLwu77e62TFtgWQwUCgTJBzShhgQDBodCYZAkqAoEX4HqZ%2FAZCCQSWRxpENu53EfCEgQZRhxzTmYy82bBHwGYLwnVWGg%2BNQB3%2BEEWry2AkS%2FML5q%2FEdy4Ild7c3LtIAPKvsxg4lTGfliXd0JqZWbYNuw8e3LPyv3HXHnTn9f5phCPEiAZzshyIgxGbyTT%2F0SZv6ijK4umK8DGybu8XYZ5wLcCvh3wywHv%2FPG3d%2Fdir3%2Bmh3uJga3LVL7z46uHv6JuYJMi4Nf9aX3ItRCVmkli08vbEdC9Fb4mujvVXyDxe30CxOJC1ScCAAA%3D.EweloBhBmUEZQDMCmATZAnAhgGwPoDGA9hgG7IAuFyIIcEDIUzQA&bn=corvette%20laser

[CoffeeBean]

Originally posted by ApathicAlpaca:

This was ROUGHLY what I had in mind, kinda... maybe... dunno.
Really need advice if this could work. If heat vent beams have a bad placement on Corvette then I'm screwed I guess. I dont know any other way to get rid of heat quickly without using sinks.

https://coriolis.io/outfit/federal_corvette?code=A0putpFklndzswf50x0x2a2a2a29290404040e00030j044kfh5s1O05m92d-1K32016gC5.Iw18ZVA%3D.Aw18ZVA%3D.H4sIAAAAAAAAA42SoU4DQRRFLwu77e62TFtgWQwUCgTJBzShhgQDBodCYZAkqAoEX4HqZ%2FAZCCQSWRxpENu53EfCEgQZRhxzTmYy82bBHwGYLwnVWGg%2BNQB3%2BEEWry2AkS%2FML5q%2FEdy4Ild7c3LtIAPKvsxg4lTGfliXd0JqZWbYNuw8e3LPyv3HXHnTn9f5phCPEiAZzshyIgxGbyTT%2F0SZv6ijK4umK8DGybu8XYZ5wLcCvh3wywHv%2FPG3d%2Fdir3%2Bmh3uJga3LVL7z46uHv6JuYJMi4Nf9aX3ItRCVmkli08vbEdC9Fb4mujvVXyDxe30CxOJC1ScCAAA%3D.EweloBhBmUEZQDMCmATZAnAhgGwPoDGA9hgG7IAuFyIIcEDIUzQA&bn=corvette%20laser

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNiR5MbH_vU

I would suggest you take a look at this site, select the corvette and look at your weapons convergence http://a.teall.info/edsa/?s=adder

I'm not sure I would use this setup but feel free to try it out at a nav beacon to see if you like it.

[Tennozan]

Of course it is. I have a highly engineered Corvette with 3 beam laser weapons and 4 rail guns. The laser weapons strip the shields off of targets in a few shots, then the rail guns bore holes in the hull with each hit scored. The rail guns only knock down the enemy hulls about 20 percent each volley but you can imagine it makes quick work of an opponent. Admittedly, some times they shoot back. I've even had my shields knocked down to 50 percent with a particularly bad customer before. Bag a few kills, then off for a nice bourbon and some rest.

[JL::Jose-Juan Kenobi]

Currently flying the Vette with 2s + 2m pulse + 1LBeam thermal vent, 2 huge MCs overcharged. All gimballed.
The large hardpoint sitting underneath the ship, and pretty far back, is kind of "troublesome" when it comes to aiming, anything close remotely above my nose and it can't see it.

All I can say regarding your proposal would be
- weapon convergence may not be ideal
- Manual aim, the Vette is slow... I mean is pretty great for it's size, but still slow by all means.
- very power hungry, gotta put those shield boosters in there too (no need to waste in point defense turret IMO)

I'm actually planning of having rails on the two small hardpoints, with feedback cascade, to help against bigger ranked ships that pop SCBs. Which is similar to what I do with the Chieftain.

Yeah, SCBs help, you have to use them wisely. I'm using prismatics with thermal resistance and in HAZ RES they haven't gone down yet, haven't used SCBs.
It takes practice to know what amount of damage you can take, from what type of ships, their ranks etc.

One final thought is; kind of weird hearing you are new to the game and planning to get a Corvette...:-) I mean is cool to have that goals, is a great ship... but keep in mind the sticker shock when you buy them, nearly 1bil on rest of outfitting plus engineering, and with near 40mil rebuy.
If you haven't used rail guns, or heck combat in general, suggest give it a try with smaller ships first; my current favorite being the Chieftain, but the Krait and the Vulture being incredibly fun as well, and each one teaches you something along the way with lower risk.

g. luck! o7

[ApathicAlpaca]

Yeah I'm kinda going full in, played some Vulture and a little little bit of FdL, now just mining for the ~550k required for Corvette - thank God for the evacuation event to grind rank. (dunno where 1b should come from, not from the setup I had planned to start with anyway)
I'll start with beacons and normal RES to get the hang of it. Also probably a good way to level up fighter so it doesnt drain as much from bounties. (afaik the pilot takes lower cut when you level him instead of directly buying expert)

Corvette being large is a valid point and yeah, railguns are fixed... hmm. Maybe I should really start with a more classic setup. I hear pure lasers works well for many ppl. I just dont want to constantly go back for ammo so that really limits the choices... not a fan of farming synth mats, ESPECIALLY not planet ones.

[JL::Jose-Juan Kenobi]

Yep, I think you have to try few combos what works for you, and even what would be cool, I want to try Plasma Accelerators too for example.
Totally agree on training the pilot, it actually doesn't take long, they rank up rather quickly.

[misc65]

If you want to do a beam and rail build, an anaconda would be a better choice. The medium hardpoints on the vette are too far apart to land consistent shots on anything but a large ship, and you will have to position yourself carefully just to get those to work.

[Dolphin Bottlenose]

With Corvette everything is possible, even heat death. :)

SCBs are not used against stronger NPCs. They are used to recharge your shields fast. If you have good and fast recharging shields to begin with (Bi-Weave with good resistances across the board), then you may never use SCBs through your whole battle, as your shields will not get dangerously low. I keep an SCB on my Corvette just in case, but I don't remember when I had to use it the last time.

SCBs are more useful if you use slow-recharging shields, like Prismatics. With SCBs you don't have to wait for too long before you recharge. It can be sidestepped by reboot/repair that brings your shields back to 50%.

[Jeffreyac]

Originally posted by ApathicAlpaca:

Originally posted by Jeffreyac:

Well, I don't have any railgun experience, but I do have beams on the three class 3 hardpoints on my vette, and can tell you the convergence isn't great. I don't worry about it generally, as I use them mostly to strip shields, but it's hard to get two of the beams to lock on a target, and pretty much impossible to get all 3.

So my first thought with a mostly-rails build was you may have some issues with convergence if you want to fire them all at once. (My second thought would be heat and power, but that's another discussion...)

The hardpoint placement then is not good for beams? Even gimballed? That's a shame :(

Wonder how to get rid of heat then. Heatsinks takes important slots and has only 3 ammo :(

Oh, sorry, didn't come back to this thread to see this question...

Mine are fixed - gimballed would be fine, I imagine, but as rails are also fixed this is what made me concerned about the convergence if you put rails on (as far as I know, all rails are fixed mount...)

[ApathicAlpaca]

I read that medium ships can hold their own if outfitted correctly. Would you say that, say, a FdL with grade 3 engineering on important modules (shields, pp, weapons, thruster) could be similar in performance to Corvette in HazRes or possibly CZ? So far, the only advantage of medium ships I heard about was they are more agile and better with fixed weapons (railgun...). That sounds as if Corvette would be definitely better but I'm not certain.

Also, how do you manage to get to engineers with Corvette? Even with Guardian FSD it has super-low jump range. Do you guys use an Anaconda or stuff outfitted for jump range, then just put the modules on it you wish to engineer, go to engi, go back and exchange them to your Corvette? I see no other way since you cannot engineer stored modules (which is an insanely stupid design btw)
Oh and if you upgrade module to a new grade, is the experimental effect still on it or do you need to re-apply it? If I have experimental effect on G3, go to G4, will it persist?

Thanks.

[AJ24]

Originally posted by ApathicAlpaca:

I read that medium ships can hold their own if outfitted correctly. Would you say that, say, a FdL with grade 3 engineering on important modules (shields, pp, weapons, thruster) could be similar in performance to Corvette in HazRes or possibly CZ? So far, the only advantage of medium ships I heard about was they are more agile and better with fixed weapons (railgun...). That sounds as if Corvette would be definitely better but I'm not certain.

Also, how do you manage to get to engineers with Corvette? Even with Guardian FSD it has super-low jump range. Do you guys use an Anaconda or stuff outfitted for jump range, then just put the modules on it you wish to engineer, go to engi, go back and exchange them to your Corvette? I see no other way since you cannot engineer stored modules (which is an insanely stupid design btw)
Oh and if you upgrade module to a new grade, is the experimental effect still on it or do you need to re-apply it? If I have experimental effect on G3, go to G4, will it persist?

Thanks.

For engineers, you can fit your chosen modules in longer range ships and head out there, but it's not too bad taking a Corvette. And there is always pinned blueprints.

Experimental effects do stay as long as you're upgrading the same engineering (like going g3 to g4) but if you change it you lose everything and start again