Imperial Cutter - combat and loadouts

[Black Rose]

Why mirrored instead of military armor?

The majority of NPCs use beamed weapons and the reflective armor is meant to deal with that. The heavy armor plate gives you about 40% of the MGC resistance to kinetic weapons back.

MGC is 50% resistant to Energy and Kinetic weapons
Mirrored armor is 75% to Energy and 25% to Kinetic and the armor bulks back 40% so you have about 35% resistance to kinetic.

[Black Rose]

Today I changed my loadout to incorporate turreted beams and a couple of fixed pulses to help speed up shield stripping:

http://coriolis.io/outfit/imperial_cutt ... 0Shift%202

But the problem was that a stupid NPC in a RES wandered in front of the path of the turreted beams, which was later destroyed and *I* got a 5-day bounty as a result. Suicidewinder to the rescue again.

There was a post elsewhere regarding turreted weapons, my Tufu, I think. The whole difference between "target only" and "fire at will" was discussed and it was determined that the "fire at will" setting would prevent what happened to you.

[Phillipus]

There was a post elsewhere regarding turreted weapons, my Tufu, I think. The whole difference between "target only" and "fire at will" was discussed and it was determined that the "fire at will" setting would prevent what happened to you.

I was using "Target Only" mode, so I'll check out the "Fire at will" mode. Thanks for the tip.

[Black Rose]

There was a post elsewhere regarding turreted weapons, my Tufu, I think. The whole difference between "target only" and "fire at will" was discussed and it was determined that the "fire at will" setting would prevent what happened to you.

I was using "Target Only" mode, so I'll check out the "Fire at will" mode. Thanks for the tip.

Here is the discussion thread on turrets

https://elitepve.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=4608

[Schmobius]

Why mirrored instead of military armor?

The majority of NPCs use beamed weapons and the reflective armor is meant to deal with that. The heavy armor plate gives you about 40% of the MGC resistance to kinetic weapons back.

MGC is 50% resistant to Energy and Kinetic weapons
Mirrored armor is 75% to Energy and 25% to Kinetic and the armor bulks back 40% so you have about 35% resistance to kinetic.

When you say the armor bulks back 40%, are you talking about using hull reinforcement packages on top of mirrored armor? I might be misunderstanding here.

[Black Rose]

Why mirrored instead of military armor?

The majority of NPCs use beamed weapons and the reflective armor is meant to deal with that. The heavy armor plate gives you about 40% of the MGC resistance to kinetic weapons back.

MGC is 50% resistant to Energy and Kinetic weapons
Mirrored armor is 75% to Energy and 25% to Kinetic and the armor bulks back 40% so you have about 35% resistance to kinetic.

When you say the armor bulks back 40%, are you talking about using hull reinforcement packages on top of mirrored armor? I might be misunderstanding here.

Yes the hull reinforcement packages add armor to the ship and its meant to handle any kinetic damage that gets past the reflective armor.

I find the majority of NPCs use energy weapons. Of course a few use cannons or rail guns so its a toss up. Most people go with MGC as handles both weapon types at 50%. I used the reflective armor on my Imperial Eagle and on my Courier with pretty good success even though both ships are made of paper lol

Today in a Haz Res spot I had high speed head on with a Gunship. He was turbo boosting to me and I was turbo boosting to him. To quote Commander Kang from and old Star Trek episode it was "Glorious!" Totally wrecked its shields and brought its hull down to 20%. I was beat up as well, shields down and lost 20% of my hull which meant I could stay in the zone for another hour or so

When in doubt, kill'em all and let God sort it out!

[Phillipus]

I've got to rave once more about this loadout:

http://coriolis.io/outfit/imperial_cutt ... ZhA?bn=Wow

It's a turreted beams, PA, and Cannon configuration. I spent 4 hours in a High RES with it last night. It's a total beast.

I have three fire groups set up (B1 = Primary fIre button, B2 = Secondary fire button. Turret mode set to "Target Only"):

Group 1
B1 - Turreted beams
B2 - KWS

Group 2
B1 - Turreted beams
B1 - Plasma Accelerators
B2 - Cannons

Group 3
B1 - Plasma Accelerators
B2 - Cannons

So I start with fire group 1 and target the NPC and press B1 to get the turreted beams going and hold B2 for the KWS. Once the KWS has finished I select fire group 2 (which will allow the turrets to keep going) and I can then shoot the PAs and Cannons at the same time. If I need to stop the turrets firing (an NPC in the way) I can switch to fire group 3.

I'm heading back into the RES now...

[Phillipus]

So I tried yet another weapons loadout on the Cutter, after I read a guy's post on the official forums https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthrea ... ost3610541

He recommends 3 PAs and 4 MCs.

I went to a Haz RES and tried it. I've got to say that this is possibly the worst weapons loadout ever for the Cutter in this PvE situation. The PAs are slow projectile weapons so the target needs to be right in front of you, close up, and large. If any of these conditions are not met, you will be frustrated. It's OK for NPC Condas, but anything that is faster than that, well...good luck!

[Black Rose]

So I tried yet another weapons loadout on the Cutter, after I read a guy's post on the official forums https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthrea ... ost3610541

He recommends 3 PAs and 4 MCs.

I went to a Haz RES and tried it. I've got to say that this is possibly the worst weapons loadout ever for the Cutter in this PvE situation. The PAs are slow projectile weapons so the target needs to be right in front of you, close up, and large. If any of these conditions are not met, you will be frustrated. It's OK for NPC Condas, but anything that is faster than that, well...good luck!

I've never used a setup like that unless I was pirating and specifically targeting engines. And pirating with a Corvette is just plain sick .
But more to the point, I imagine that most people wing up and use whatever load out they fancy. The load out that you illustrate reminds of how "attack" groups set their ships up in Eve Online. Their were ships set up to lock down the target IE prevent the warp dive from being used and also drain them of power. Once a ship was locked down like that the heavier ships moved in and took down shields and other systems until the target surrendered and/or was destroyed. So a ship loaded up with kinetic weapons would be the ship killer that moves in after the rest of the team has rendered the target immobile and susceptible to kinetic weapons

[Phillipus]

I've never used a setup like that unless I was pirating and specifically targeting engines. And pirating with a Corvette is just plain sick .
But more to the point, I imagine that most people wing up and use whatever load out they fancy. The load out that you illustrate reminds of how "attack" groups set their ships up in Eve Online. Their were ships set up to lock down the target IE prevent the warp dive from being used and also drain them of power. Once a ship was locked down like that the heavier ships moved in and took down shields and other systems until the target surrendered and/or was destroyed. So a ship loaded up with kinetic weapons would be the ship killer that moves in after the rest of the team has rendered the target immobile and susceptible to kinetic weapons

I agree that that kind of loadout works better when in a wing. In fact the Cutter itself works better when in a wing.