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Review of the Pilot Ships (Fed)?
trypwyr
Member Posts: 30 Arc User
Against my better judgment, I sold the bulk of my 2mil dil and got enough Z to pick up the Fed 3-pack of pilot ships. Then I hesitated...
Does anyone have an honest review of these things?
Does anyone have an honest review of these things?
Post edited by trypwyr on
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That's as much of a review as I can make, because I'm still at work and haven't been able to do much more.
But is it fun to fly? God yes.
If they'd had a limited time discount like the command ships and pathfinder bundle did when they launched, I would have picked them up after seeing that.
I basically just transferred the loadout that I use in my Tempest and my Armitage into it, worked in a couple pilot abilities in the hybrid seat, and let it rip.
Like the posters above said, it's really, really fast. Also extremely nimble. Without any buffs running I was sitting at ~impulse 50 and a turn rate of about 65.
Damage-wise, I didn't seem to be putting out as much. I usually use the Japori system patrol as a benchmark for DPS. My main does about 20k in his Fleet Excelsior. The toon I am using the Pilot ship on usually does about 10k - 11k in there in a Tempest or Armitage. I did about 7k in the new Pilot ship. Most of that, I'm sure, has to do with getting comfortable with the way it flies, the best ways to use the new console(s), etc.
Overall I'm pretty happy with it. Loaded it up with 4 dual beam banks and a torpedo up front, with an omni and a cutting beam in the back. In my other escorts it's usually 3 dual beam banks and a torp up front, omni, cutting beam, and array on the back.
I'll be playing around with it more tonight and see how it works out. Also replacing the Radiant torpedo from Blood of the Ancients with the Delta Neutronic torpedo this evening. Should help a little.
As an owner of the Defiant (all variants), Kumari (all variants) fleet Phantom and a ton of other escorts on my main I can honestly say I was personally crossing my fingers for a replacement for my Kumari. She has felt somewhat outdated recently despite being one of my most powerfully geared ships.
I am VERY happy with my purchase and I had great fun in the short time I toyed with it today (tactical variant to start). I found the movement and motion to be very fluid and enjoyable and having bought the three pack the customization options were nice.
I've not taken it into an advanced STF though, but I feel very confident that with an at least half competent team most space missions will be very fun.
However I will say to truly fly these ships to their true potential in Advanced or Elite I would personally advise the beverage of your choice to make sure you are fully awake.
As they say: "They go like s*** off a shovel" (quite nimble). Of course this is just my personal and brief appraisal but of all my recent purchases from the C-store in the last year or so these put a smile on my face that wasn't me trying to make myself feel better but genuinely made me happy.
"If this will be our end, then I will have them make SUCH an end as to be worthy of rememberance! Out of torpedos you say?! Find me the ferengi!".
So far, here's how it's gone for me:
* The retro-rockets pilot maneuver is absurdly useful. I tend to drop GW and then barrel in with a beam spike and a cannon blast, but with my Defiant I'd often be going too fast. With the science pilot ship I can drop to half-throttle, unleash my pain, then double-tap back and I've suddenly got an extra five kilometres to punish the NPCs in.
* It's an adjustment having to change how I fly. I like having the pilot maneuvers set to double-tap because I need to do them intuitively, but I'm so used to cruisers and making escort micro-maneuvers that I find I tap left and right instinctively and barrel-roll myself when I'm actually just trying to keep my nose pointed at the target.
* The ship is really quite flimsy, though this might just be my not having a fleet neutronium on her yet. I'd say she's about as tough as my fleet Defiant, maybe a little flimsier, but the evasive maneuvers mean I don't have to carry EP to Engines or wait for Evasive Maneuvers to come off cooldown to get the hell out and heal.
* The biggest problem I'm having with the ship so far is I'm so fast that I tend to overshoot my target, especially when I'm not able to establish a good approach arc/alpha strike, ie. those patrols when a Vaadwuar ship warps in on top of you. I wonder if the ship would work better as a beam boat, but at the same time, the pilot maneuvers seem almost tailor-made for boosting to optimal cannon-firing positions.
Actual join date: Open beta, 2009ish.
Also, if keeping the enemy in front isn't an option for the moment, you can leave a very nasty wake behind you (Subspace Eddy), whereas using Spatial Sinkhole can perfectly set up a barrage from your weapons or the Microprojectile Barrage to eliminate a bunch of enemies quickly. Just remember to not fly through the explosions, just like most other escorts.
In fact, I was afraid they'd be even more glass cannon-y than other escorts, but they're right around on par or marginally better.
In short, I'll take a Pilot Escort above an Intel Escort or many other escorts short of my beloved Fleet Patrol Escort. It should end up as a top tier escort pick, so long as people learn how to use their maneuverability and pilot BOff skills well.
Skirt the perimeter or dive quickly in and spin around. Use rolls to dodge kinetic damage. Stack massive frontal firepower. Should do well.
Here is a tip.. use lock trajectory.. it drops your inertia to zero allowing you to "slide or skid" your way past ships but allowing you to keep the front of your ship pointed at the targets. this gives you a possible 20km run instead of 10km as you pop it just before you would go past the target... using throttle and zero inertia you will glide past while blazing away.
its not easy to do but when you pull it off its pretty cool looking and feeling.
See the part where I don't have my pilot boffs lined up yet. I am, in fact, aware Tokyo Drif- I mean, Lock Trajectory exists.
Actual join date: Open beta, 2009ish.
It's like flying a Bird of Prey.
Only better in every way.
As I am pretty much in the same boat (pun intended, Kumari), this is great news!
Thanks everyone, I am off to buy now.
If you go with the full console set, it emphasizes throttle settings. Moar is better. Some Pilot BOFF abilities are the same way, like "Hold It Together" which really wants you at 100% throttles when you use it. I'm personally not sold on the full 3 piece because the stats of the consoles themselves. 2 piece bonus is nice.
But the player has to realize that setting the throttle to 100% all the time is not ideal for PVE, especially if you're using Cannons. You have to be in position long enough to apply that damage output. You zooming around all over the map doesn't do anything towards that. But with these ships, you should easily get into position and blaze away. Hello Intep Spec +Flanking bonus! They also have many tools to get your speed going and get you out of trouble very quickly.
Beamscorting them is a bit tricky if you want to maintain higher throttle settings.
I'm still undecided on Pilot BOFF abilities, been experimenting. Here's 2 FYI's for you guys out there:
Attack Pattern Lambda, Lambda, Lambda shares CD with the 3 TAC Attack Patterns.
Reroute Reserves to Weapons shares CD with TAC Beam & Cannon abilities.
Well lock trajectory allows you to keep your ship facing an enemy while moving in a different direction so that's helps with keep full speed and keeping your guns on target.
Reroute Reserves to Weapons is no different then Surgical Strikes in that regard. Its a better then rapid cannon fire and beams don't have a rapid fire multi cycle attack just beam over load. The fact that your weapons drain no power makes it worth using in single target dps.
Attack pattern Lamba wont replace Alpha or Beta attack patterns for sure. But using BFAW on my DBB setup it was effective for aoe as I got multi confuse hits on many ships and they started attacking each other for a limited time. So its very situational.. and I feel better when used with a aoe attack on a large group. The +ACC would also work with crit d weapon builds in pvp.
With lock trajectory and your 5km backward slide you can keep uptime pretty easily on even pve targets even at full speed. Also you can always go DBB and instead of cannons if your really worried avout uptime. On the big ships like dreads and cubes you turn so fast you can spin in the middle of the ship and keep guns on target with out ever being out of front facing with the ship your fighting.
Yeah, I toyed with RRtW1 & 2 (I need 3 damnit) vs CRF2 & 3. Flying the same, the damage is noticeable in favor of RRtW. This was with a 5 DHC+Heavy Phaser Turret+KCB setup. I'd like to try with DBB due to the friendlier arcs and damage dropoff with range. Haven't stuffed any torpedoes.
I haven't used Attack Pattern Lambda yet but reading it is kind of interesting. +Acc in PVE is meaningless with how easy it is to hit NPCs. Perception reduction, not sure about. But the chance to confuse is interesting. Especially if you toss in a multi-target CSV/BFAW. Like I said, haven't used it yet and just theorizing here.
Need to toy some more with the stuff. There's lots of things in Pilot that are far more out of the established norm than even Intel and Command. If you want to toy with Pilot, it mutates what we know about Escort driving a lot.
Warmaker, send me a padd in game and I'll send you back RRtW3. @Protector is my handle.
Please enable us to buy a token with Zen to faction change a 25th Century FED to a TOS FED.
DPS wise they have everything they need. My sci fed is sustaining the 20-30k range with pugs in infected using cannons, a grav well and torp spread.
The double tap dodge is fantastic. Its going to feel strange flying ships without it now.
I haven't been overly impressed with the pilot abilities but I haven't taken the time to do any testing and number crunching yet. There may be some good ways to exploit them, or they may turn out to be duds.
The shared cool downs with other abilities are a problem as with a conventional weapon enhancement + attack Pat build they are poor substitutes for existing enhancements that they share a slot with. This assessment could be widely off though as I have yet to try and really capitalize on them. Certainly for my current build, which already mitigates power drain with some expensive toys I am finding rapid fire stays ahead of RRtW3.
Despite the lack of initial WoW from the abilities the combination of manoeuvrability, choice of lt.com (depending on which ship you go with), 5 forward weapons and 5 tactical consoles are a combination for Fun.
The retrorocket reverse maneuver means you can keep your nose pointed at the same shield facing while maintaining Pedal to the Medal all night long.
The maneuvers get you into a fight fast, and out again with barely a scratch when CSV backfires.
The 3-piece console set grants you +33% turret and cannon damage, for crying out loud! That alone should be worth the 6000 Zen.
They feel good, they move well, they can pack a real punch. Piscorts are the real deal, folks.
Okay, they probably will never beat FAW spam, but that's FAW's problem, not mine.
Pilot BOFF skills are a real boon too. Great mix of offensive, defensive, and control effects there.
The BOFF seating arrangement is basically what we Defiant drivers have been asking for four years.
If you like escorts, the Piscorts are a dream come true.
After my NWS runs the past 2 years b4 it was patched out I will always keep a sentimental attitude towards cannon build escorts with a lt commander sci slot on it so Im considering the sci version of it. Looks like to have an interesting trait as well.
Atm I sit back and let cryptic solve the ability related lag issues in pve maps.
If thats straightened out I think I grab one or two.
Too bad there isnt a bundle for the same ship type which distributes thought the factions.
Looking for a fun PvE fleet? Join us at Omega Combat Division today.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sg2Dqdm8he8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRZ9FyK4U3k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGqUuJ0dXFg
Top DPS 102k
LOVE Lock Trajectory! Also, the Kolvoord Starburst when calling in reinforcements is pretty cool looking. I wonder if it does damage?
RRtW really doesn't work well with tac abilities, unfortunately.
Also, for a cool combo maneuver:
Trap some targets with Coolant Ignition
Swing around and pop Lock Trajectory.
Face your trapped foes while strafing past them and unleash Scatter Volley and Missile Barrage from the Mercury.
RRtW does not share cool down with APB...
It only shares with weapon skills such as cannon rapid fire, beam fire at will etc. No different then intel skill Surgical Strikes.
It's attack pattern Lambda that's share a cools down with APB.
The Lootcritter posted a lengthy article last night. Surprisingly positive
http://lootcritter.com/2015/05/08/hands-on-first-impressions-on-pilot-ships-federation-icarus-bug-ship/
I got my Klingon SCI with very high Pilot and got it. He's a PADD Manufacturing Mill for my characters right now :cool: But thank you for the offer though, appreciate it.
RRtW is nice, especially 3. +60% fire rate, no weapons drain but from Engines.
I love these ships. I haven't had this much fun in an Escort for a very long time and it greatly changes what we know and play as one. But there's a very fine line between zooming around like your hair is on fire and doing **** for damage to support your team or zooming around like your hair is on fire yet still doing punishing damage.
The line gets blurred even more with diving into Pilot Specialization Tree. "Pedal to the Medal" is fabulous with +10% damage bonus and full mastery improves the trait to +20%. But you need a stack of 10 of Pedal to the Medal built up with time in 100% throttle, and it has to stay there. The moment you bring it back to even 75%, you lose the bonus entirely. Finding a build and playstyle to support that and still be effective in damage is still taking some work on my part.
The older, established T5U/T6 Escorts I believe will still be able to apply their damage better than the Pilot Ships, IMO. At least, it's easier to apply that damage. They don't need to be flying 100% throttles all the time and slipping and sliding all over the place, though higher speed helps on the Bonus Defense.
But if you know your flying and are quick in your play, you should be able to wring out some great stuff out of these ships.
I'd have to concur with that.
I used to fly far more Escorts in the past. DHCs, DHCs+DBB, DHCs+Torp, DHCs+DBB+Torp, 7 Beam Array Beamscort. You name it, I flew it, PVE and PVP with an Escort. But that was a while ago. Like many others I'd gotten on the Beamboating/BFAW thing. For me my DHC play was off the mark.
In what way? You can fly a standard escort with pedal to the metal. If anything it is easier to keep guns on target in a pilot ship to get that bonus and keep it. Also things like subwarp sheath trait from the sci ship that at full throttle you can gain up to 15% armor pen. Also there are a few skills the take advantage of being at full speed.
If you don't want to take advantage of pedal to the metal or subwarp sheath they are just like any other escort.. well other then the fact they are a 5/2 5 tac. making them on par with the highest dps escorts such as the andorian.
They pretty much took the best of the escorts in layout, tac slots, turn rate and weapon slots then slapped even more maneuverability. nothing stopping you from playing the pilot ships like a standered escort. in that role it will still win.. as there is nothing that a normal escort has that these pilot ships don't.
And a merry freaking Christmas to you too, Ebenezer.
-jonsills, 'Cryptic Why the sales..instead of Fixing XP leveling and this game?'