[miahmagick]

So, my original plan was to play an Antiproton Heavy Tank and was working towards that goal until a random, kind stranger handed me a Maquis Raider. I tasted Plasma Storm, and decided to transition to SCI with the N'Kaam dariusjenai gave me (thanks for that!). Since then I've enjoyed the game immensely, and been working to improve. I enjoy doing solo Patrols, and after doing some events with the Fleet I've come up with my first major goal: I want to be able to solo Patrols on Elite with no deaths consistently.

However, with both the Red Alert event and Black Friday coming up, I'm finding myself at a crossroads between two choices, and I feel like the prudent thing would be to choose one for now and save the other for later.

Option 1: I work towards a Dranuur SCI build, the Ultimate Tech Upgrade from the Red Alert event goes towards my Secondary Deflector, and any Black Friday spending I do will be towards this goal (ex.Grissom). This will likely give me good DPS, but I'm concerned about survivability. With my current play, I often find there are moments with my N'Kaam where I have a lapse in my control effects and things get very hairy. I'm generally good enough to not die on Normal, even w/ a 27k Hull ship, if I don't take too many torpedoes to the face at once, but that's a far cry from Elite. I can see how the Temporal Operative seat giving more Anomalies, and the upcoming Winter Event will help (especially if I grab the aforementioned Grissom), but I know this is a ship that lives or dies on my piloting and ability to keep everything under control, and let me be honest: I've not been playing long and my piloting mistakes are frequent enough to get me killed.

Option 2: I work towards a Justiciar Heavy Tank. From my research FAW is currently a very flawed firing mode with neither of its two traits fully giving it what it needs compared to other options. After a lot of deliberation, I've decided I'd go Entwined Tactical Matrices over Redirecting Arrays for the consistency, and have even thought up how I'll manage the Torp' Spread. The ship won't come together as quickly or cleanly as the Dranuur. Some very big upgrades are hidden behind the Lobi store, and I'm likely a year out from being able to access that in any meaningful way. I also will not have great DPS, and will have to use threat bonuses in my SCI-slots (Plasma-Generating Weapon Signature Nullifiers) to hold aggro, especially at first when my weapons aren't fully leveled and built out. However, in many games, I love building tanky characters who can wade into <insert arbitrarily large number of enemies here> and come out on top, and I feel like this is the best way to facilitate that in this game (to my knowledge).

I'd like some suggestions on the current options, as well as open to hearing any recommendations that I haven't considered. I've only been playing around a couple of weeks, so I have a lot to learn, and I welcome the insight of players more knowledgeable than myself.

In addition, if there's anyone I can mail with questions and thoughts about the game, I'd love to be able to get advice and feedback during the week (Fleet event days are covered, and y'all are great ).

EDIT: Also apologize if this is in the wrong channel.

[Jestersmith]

i would go with what is achievable the quickest and work on the other over time.

As for questions just post them someone will always answer

[darthnovawave]

I'd echo Jester's comments and suggest you work towards what is most fun for you. Without knowing what you do and don't already have available, it is tough to know which might be the faster, easier route here. I personally play both types of builds pretty regularly, and both can be fun in their own right but they usually require very different build strategies and chasing very different types of gear, traits, etc.

I'd suspect the tank route might be the faster route to getting you to the point where you can solo elite patrols without dying. FAW gets a bad rap because it used to actually be the favored DPS weapon mode once upon a time, but in classic Cryptic fashion they overnerfed it several years ago, and extending the uptime of the mode is as you noted much more convoluted than the other firing modes. Even after the nerf though, it still creates a 20km sphere of fire around you though on a typical beam array build, so from a piloting standpoint it is probably the easiest AOE attack form to build threat with compared to an EPG or CSV tank (e.g., the other 2 main AOE attack approaches in game).

With your comment about building around antiproton, I'm assuming the lobi purchases you are referring to are ba'ul set pieces? If so, those are "nice to have" pieces, but you can build a viable elite-level tank without using any lobi equipment. The Plasma-Generating Weapon Signature consoles also got nerfed really hard around 2017 and they aren't worthwhile anymore, and I'd note that if you are using the Nullifier version, you are actually reducing the amount of threat you are generating overall, which hurts your ability to draw fire off your teammates. Generally for surviability you'll want to chase the Energetic Protomatter Matrix Infuser consoles from the fleet colony holding along with maybe one or two other survivability consoles, and the rest of your consoles should buff your DPS potential. Again, not sure what gear you might already have handy, but if nothing else you might consider chasing isomag consoles since the Justiciar has plenty of engineering console space.

Space wizard builds are fun to fly, but science vessels like the Dranuur scout ship typically have the weakest hulls of any ship type. Survivability on these kinds of builds typically involves slamming your opponents with massive AOE bursts of DPS space magic to vape everything before they have a chance to shoot back. If the enemy survives your DPS burst on an elite map, you are probably going to crumple pretty quickly from the return fire. EPG tanks do exist and Distant Knight has been really successful at this using the Compiler event ship from the beginning of this year, but they are pretty uncommon and there isn't a lot of material out there on strategies to build this type of ship. Generally, EPG builds at the high end use Universal console clickies like the Plasma Storm Module (particularly if you can get ahold of the Unconventional Systems space trait to get the consoles up more often), along with proccing the Deterioriating Secondary Deflector as you've noted and having lots of anomalies paired with the Spore-Infused Anomalies starship trait off the Sommerville/Balth. Chasing all these crimes against nature meta EPG DPS toys can get really expensive, so you might want to take stock of what you have and crunch the numbers on what you'd need to still chase.

[Rastilion]

You also have a Maquis Raider on your hands.
It isn't the top meta ship, but it is still a very fun cannon boat. It is a glass cannon, so you won't make it through the center of a furball. But you can roll it up quite efficiently from the outside in. Elite patrols and TFOs are no problem if built decently.

Side note here:
There a quite a few people that hate flying this kind of small, agile ship. It's too fast for them. If you want to go that route, try flying it first.
The heavy tank is a brick by comparison.

[miahmagick]

I have trouble piloting the Maquis Raider. Heck, I have trouble piloting the N'Kaam sometimes. I recognize the Dranuur isn't bulky, but it is almost twice as bulky as what I'm currently flying.

I have Plasma Storm. I have Unconventional Systems and Spore-Infused Anomalies. The former came from a very generous stranger. The latter two came from a friend (Thank you Bridger for offering to give me Unconventional Systems though! I really appreciated it). They recommended I use the T6 token I was given on the Gagarin, but I'd already tasted Plasma Storm so went for the Somerville instead.

What I mean by "cheaper": I only need to really Mk XV the Secondary Deflector for my major power spike as opposed to 7-8 weapons. I'm also considering that on Black Friday a big upgrade to the ship's performance would come from the Grissom, while the Justiciar needs Gagarin to properly function, and also wants Narendra and Arbiter. Both probably want things I'm still unfamiliar with (I've been playing two weeks ).

I'm just trying to be realistic with my progression understanding I only have so many materials at the start to invest into a build, and if I stretch myself too thin that I'll end up with two mediocre ships that don't accomplish my goals rather than one really good ship that does.

I appreciate everyone who's responded though. It's been really helpful to have such a supportive Fleet as I'm learning the game.

[darthnovawave]

Understand all too well what you mean by stretching yourself thin. I run 3 different toons pretty regularly as "mains" (1 of each career), so I've sank a LOT of EC and dilithium over the years buying the same traits and gear for each of them over the years. I'd probably have a lot more cooler toys on one toon had I not done this, but in exchange it is kind of nice to be able to switch toons and keep playing at around the same level of performance when hit with unfair leaver penalties for broken TFOs and whatnot.

The Lukari ships (N'Kaam, Dranuur, and Ho'kuun) are interchangeable parts in the ship tailor, so you can swap between the frisbee, boomerang, and the dorito chip looks if you happen to also have access to the Ho'kuun. One thing to bear in mind when flying the Dranuur when you pick it up is that it has raider flanking, so unlike a lot of other EPG builds, you'll want to try to position yourself behind targets to get that boost to any energy weapons and torpedoes you may be using (it doesn't apply to space magic or mines).

Having a Mk XV secondary deflector should be a good source of damage for you, so that's probably a good call. Just make sure you have a deteriorating one before upgrading it as the other 2 types are kinda garbage. If you need recommendations, I personally just run a crafted one with EPG, Ctrlx, and the SA +DMG mods, but the fleet colony ones that give you a mod for projectile damage are a good option too, particularly since you'll also have Raider Flanking potentially further boosting damage there. Also don't forget to have a few bridge officer powers that trigger the dish, particularly the ones that hit multiple foes like Charged Particle Burst, Destablilizing Resonance Beam, and maybe Structural Analysis if you can afford it from the exchange.

Also, make sure you get your Science R&D up to level 15 if you haven't already to unlock the Particle Manipulator trait. It provides boosts to your CritH and CritD with exotic powers based on your EPG skill. With 250 EPG the trait caps out at +50% CritH, which is a huge boost. The CritD scales endlessly from the trait, but generally 250-300 EPG tends to be optimal on typical space wizard builds, since it usually means sacrificing other stats like +Exotic damage from other stuff.

[miahmagick]

So, I was looking at SCI ships today, just to be sure the Dranuur was the way to go, and I now see why the Compiler was mentioned. 1.425 Hull Mod on a SCI ship is pretty amazing. Sadly, doesn't look like there are any real alternatives that are currently accessible.

Made some upgrades to my ship today, and tried to do some Advanced Patrols. It... wasn't pretty. Granted, I'm still piloting a N'Kaam, so my survivability will be better once I'm in the Dranuur, but I kinda wish there were a more robust SCI ship available with the seating I want.

Despite the fact I've made pretty heavy investments into SCI, however, I'm not fully convinced I won't switch to Heavy Tank. The way I see it is having a good Secondary Deflector on the account is a solid investment (because it'll be used on any SCI ship I run), so I won't be too upset if I end up maining Heavy Tank.