Unserene wrote:The HammerAnd I'm sorry to those of you that like them, but I refuse to use SCBs. I personally think they're a cop out. If my shields go down, I have to rely on some pretty panicked evading skills to make it out alive, and that's the way I like it.
I never used them myself until very recently. It's basically just been a way to recharge shields faster between combat rather than sitting there for 5 minutes with 4 pips in systems. Until the Python I had to keep them offline. I don't use hull reinforcement packages either. I don't like the way filling a cargo hold somehow increases your hull strength. I think they're a cop out.
Anyway, time is money when RES farming.
I just ran some maneuverability tests in my Python, as kitted above, with various pips in engines. I'm sure this has been done before, but here are my results nonetheless.
The first was a 360 degree loop. I soon found out pips don't make a difference. It took about 26.5 seconds with 0 thru 4 pips in engines. Using thrusters did make a difference, but it didn't matter whether using up, down, right, or left, and the time dropped to about 16 seconds (kind of hard to time accurately with two hands required on sticks).
The second test was 5x 360 degree rolls, which took about 23 seconds w/o thrusters and 21.5 seconds with.
The last was a 360 degree yaw turn. This did have a strange result that I checked twice. With 0 pips it took about 60 seconds and with 4 pips it took about 75 seconds. They both took about 38 seconds with thrusters firing in any direction.
All tests were done with the throttle at zero and I didn't use any forward or backwards thrusters.
I think it was similar with the Vulture because I never noticed any change with pips in engines, but I did like to keep it charged for boosting. I'd also be constantly firing my thrusters, but never noticed much of a difference when pulling back on the stick whether I was using up or down thrusters, but I liked to think it did.
These results may vary when going full throttle in a dog fight. And it looks like the fastest way to turn around is to perform a half roll while pulling back on the stick and firing thrusters - then there's FA Off too (I'm going to have to practice that with thrusters).