Ship Upgrades

[misterbill5]

The Help guide says to upgrade the starting ship ASAP, but when I go shopping at the Ship Equipment stores, it seems that the "upgrades" available are not really much different in specs from the original equipment. Am I just shopping at the wrong stores?
Been getting smoked in ship combat! I turned down the difficulty to Easy, so maybe that will help while I get a better feel for space combat. Seems like a good way to find loot and maybe upgrades too, if I can win some battles...heh...
I currently have the Explorer ship with starting equipment plus the bargain FTL drive I got after doing a ground combat mission (the 25,000 credit FTL). Haven't really seen better FTL drives at the shops, but they cost around double what I paid for the quest drive...so can't see a reason to spend a bunch of credits for marginal or no improvement...

[Ranzera]

There doesn't seem to be a difference in the shops. The difference is that the shop will randomly load an inventory whenever you: enter the area, load a saved game into that area, or change ships in that area. If you want to quickly roll the shop, just do whatever is the fastest of the 3 for you.

There's minor fluctuations in item quality within each rarity and much larger variations in quality between rarities. If you want to "shoot more betterer" you're going to want to roll for rare or legendary quality guns and then probably at least a rare warp drive to power them. You might also want to upgrade your shields at some point, but if you're just getting started you can fight small ships with the stock ship shield until you get some money under your belt.

ETA: You might also want to avoid plasma weapons, since they barely scratch shields and missiles cover your explosive damage pretty well on their own. You probably will want at least 1 turret dedicated to ion damage to sap shields faster.

Second Edit: You can probably get by on exceptional guns in the start if you make sure you're only shooting the smaller fish like Light Fighters, Light Merchants, Explorers and Interceptors.

Also, don't sell your stock targeting computer. It's useful for boarding enemy vessels later since it has 0% shield bypass. You'll damage the hull less with it and get a better payout that way.

[misterbill5]

Thanks, I appreciate your reply and good advice!

[Ranzera]

You bet :)

[Dedalous]

Later in the game you will find factors that give you quests that earn you tokens for buying legendary ship equipment and little by little you will start to have and drops legendary equipment from your space battles, specially from enemy ships with skull on them.

[misterbill5]

Originally posted by Dedalous:

Later in the game you will find factors that give you quests that earn you tokens for buying legendary ship equipment and little by little you will start to have and drops legendary equipment from your space battles, specially from enemy ships with skull on them.

Thanks! I can see it will be a long process, but I have taken a modest start by upgrading my warp drive and shields to Exceptional. My ship readiness meter is now all the way to the right, so I can see some positive results. I thought it would be better to do a small upgrade now rather than wait for something uber to show up at the vendor (which I probably couldn't afford anyway...heh...). I have a few tokens and a little rep with House Halamis (in the starting system), so I see some nice gear there when I get the necessary tokens. Also got their FREE Translocator to get out of the depths of dungeons FAST...hehe...

[Dedalous]

Originally posted by misterbill5:

Originally posted by Dedalous:

Later in the game you will find factors that give you quests that earn you tokens for buying legendary ship equipment and little by little you will start to have and drops legendary equipment from your space battles, specially from enemy ships with skull on them.

Thanks! I can see it will be a long process, but I have taken a modest start by upgrading my warp drive and shields to Exceptional. My ship readiness meter is now all the way to the right, so I can see some positive results. I thought it would be better to do a small upgrade now rather than wait for something uber to show up at the vendor (which I probably couldn't afford anyway...heh...). I have a few tokens and a little rep with House Halamis (in the starting system), so I see some nice gear there when I get the necessary tokens. Also got their FREE Translocator to get out of the depths of dungeons FAST...hehe...

Yeap , thats the spirit, warp drive is the most important ship part, my first legendary ship part dropped from space battles in Achmentius , so you are in the right path .

[misterbill5]

Wow, a Legendary ship component...something to dream about...Journey of a thousand miles begins with just a single step...

[Dedalous]

Very useful video fro space combat , notice how he regulate shield and capacitor during combat , its always important to have your front shield from 80% to maximum (depend from your warp drive) mine its always now in 100% during space combat.
https://youtu.be/BJ8Gp8AZKeQ?si=szGG0xG-61yfwCvF

[misterbill5]

Thanks, I will be sure to watch the video! I just won my first space battle and got some rare ship components as loot--well ONE Rare one, a Targeting Computer...Got a couple of Exceptional Mining Lasers, and a Cargo Expansion...plus a couple of items I already had, so those got sold...

[Dedalous]

Originally posted by misterbill5:

Thanks, I will be sure to watch the video! I just won my first space battle and got some rare ship components as loot--well ONE Rare one, a Targeting Computer...Got a couple of Exceptional Mining Lasers, and a Cargo Expansion...plus a couple of items I already had, so those got sold...

Well done, and another important thing, in early stage that you have weak warp dont use turret beam (laser beam, ion beam etc ) they dont need ammo but they drain power from your warp , power that you need most on the shield, so better use turret laser, ion, plasma etc that use ammo.

[misterbill5]

Originally posted by Dedalous:

Originally posted by misterbill5:

Thanks, I will be sure to watch the video! I just won my first space battle and got some rare ship components as loot--well ONE Rare one, a Targeting Computer...Got a couple of Exceptional Mining Lasers, and a Cargo Expansion...plus a couple of items I already had, so those got sold...

Well done, and another important thing, in early stage that you have weak warp dont use turret beam (laser beam, ion beam etc ) they dont need ammo but they drain power from your warp , power that you need most on the shield, so better use turret laser, ion, plasma etc that use ammo.

Thanks again, I will check and see what I have. I haven't made any changes to weaponry other than swapping out one of the Stock missle launchers for an Exceptional. BTW, forgot that I also got a ship ore refinery from that initial space battle loot...was a nice haul! I guess you could temporarily swap in mining lasers IF in a safe area and do some mining for cash--or maybe it is better to just buy a drone and let it do the work...

[Dedalous]

Originally posted by misterbill5:

Originally posted by Dedalous:

Well done, and another important thing, in early stage that you have weak warp dont use turret beam (laser beam, ion beam etc ) they dont need ammo but they drain power from your warp , power that you need most on the shield, so better use turret laser, ion, plasma etc that use ammo.

Thanks again, I will check and see what I have. I haven't made any changes to weaponry other than swapping out one of the Stock missle launchers for an Exceptional. BTW, forgot that I also got a ship ore refinery from that initial space battle loot...was a nice haul! I guess you could temporarily swap in mining lasers IF in a safe area and do some mining for cash--or maybe it is better to just buy a drone and let it do the work...

Drones its always better for profit, mining in some safe area its good for AFK situations.

[misterbill5]

I can buy more drones now. They pay for themselves with a couple of deployments...