Pre-Build ships – but what is it all about?

[Ricardo]

Hello, I’m one of those ancient players, since December 2014. When you play a lot of Elite Dangerous, it’s hard to keep up with all the new stuff. For example, Pre-Build ships – what’s the deal with them, and who are they meant for?

Are these some special versions that are unavailable in the regular game and only purchasable with Arx? Or is it something else?

[Jeebs]

They're meant for lazy people who would rather fork out some money to skip an hour or two of early-game stuff. At least, as far as I can tell. None of the pre-built ships are particularly good, and by all accounts you can build a better ship yourself. I guess you get some ship kits with a few of them.

Other than giving you a faster start, I don't really see the point of them. You don't have to pay rebuy if you lose it, I suppose, but money becomes irrelevant so quickly that rebuy is never really an issue. For some folks, it might be worth it. To me, it's not worth forking out money for something I'll have to upgrade and rebuild anyways.

There's also early-access for new ships. That I can understand a bit more. You pay to get it three or four months before anyone else. Other than that, there are no ships being sold for Arx that aren't available in game.

[Shoestring]

Yeah, seems to be for people who don't want to earn in game to buy. I made a bunch of money with an adder and went up to an asp explorer with all the best things I could add at a station. Then I saw you can pay real money to just start with that ship. Those people then miss out on working your way up, though, so any new players out there, I would not recommend!

[Sighman]

They're definitely not unique versions. You can build better yourself.

They're great for:

A new player who wants to get the game and immediately do certain activities with their more experienced friends (e.g. bounty hunting, hauling, etc)

A player who does not want to do engineering, guardian unlocking, etc, etc.

Someone with very limited hours to put into the game.

Someone who wants to join in a time-limited event before it ends

Impatient players who want to skip the early game

People who value time more than real money.

[frumple]

There are three different groups of pre-built ships. All they have in common is they can be unlocked with ARX.
You can deploy 1 and only one instance of the ship you bought. I'm not even sure it's possible to buy more than one?


1. The early access ships. Some of the early access ships include the Python MkII, Mandalay, Cobra Mk V, and the Type 8.
These are not available in-game at all until the early access period ends.

Currently the Type 8 and Python MkII have left early access and can be bought in-game from most shipyards. They are not available in Legacy ED though.

All four are special in that they have been designed with a new type of Frame Shift Drive featuring a SuperCruise Overcharge mode. It behaves like boost, but for SC.
All ships can equip this drive, but most spiral out of control after a few seconds of use, unless they overheat and burn to a crisp. Plus they guzzle extreme amounts of fuel.

The SCO-optimized quartet listed above do not suffer these handicaps and only consume reasonable amounts of fuel while overcharging.

Pre-built ships do not cost re-buy, but installing equipment onto them WILL add re-buy costs.


2. The "Stellar" variants.

These ships are like the early access variants except they cost double, and come with equipment already installed. The ships and equipment cost no re-buy unless you buy and install modules yourself. You will have to pay insurance for those.

Since the ships are already kitted out, you will not have to add much, thus they are cheaper to fly but this doesn't really mean much.

Stellar ships come with some liveries and cosmetics unlocked.

In theory they are quite powerful, but most players regard them as inferior to what you could engineer yourself.
You don't have to spend time engineering them though.
Overall, they're of questionable value.


3. The "Jumpstart" ships

These are between vanilla and "Stellar" ships price-wise.

They have nothing to do with early access, but are instead pre-engineered and pre-outfitted ships specialized for a certain role. That can be passenger traffic, exploration, combat, or transport.

The latest ship is the Type 9, pre-outfitted with a lot of things to make trading and colonization work easier.
It looks nice but i'm not sure it's so great.

The Asp Explorer Exploration Jumpstart was released a few weeks ago, and it comes with a fully engineered, SCO FSD with a range of about 58-64ly, plus a Guardian FSD Booster that adds another ten light years.

It has crap thrusters and could be tweaked for optimum performance but even as is, it's a monster explorer capable of jumping 70+ly out of the box.
I bought one and think it's absolutely worth it, but another person might think it a waste of money.

Jumpstart and Stellar ships cannot have their modules stored or transfered to other ships. Any goodies will remain locked to them.
You are free to sell modules however (for 0 cr), and replace them with whatever you want.

Whether a Jumpstart ship is worth your time or not depends on their specialization.
You can always enghineer a ship yourself but buying a Jumpstart avoids the busywork/grind.

The DBX Exploration Jumpstart is very old by now. It doesn't have good modules or an awesome FSD. Definetly skip that one, but have a look at the rest.


All ARX ships are linked to the account you used to purchase them. They can never be lost or destroyed, and you will always be able to deploy the 0 re-buy model you bought.