Hey there,
I am very far from being an expert, reasonably proficient, or even halfway decent fighter pilot. I mainly trade and explore, combat is not my main focus, but it´s fun to blow off steam, farm mats, and I like to win occasionally, so I train once in a while. Haz-Rez, CZ, Assassinations, that kind of stuff. Not much into PvP, so far. I was mainly collecting ships rather than hone some specific built. If ganked, I tend to die a lot.
While training up for AX combat, I did some homework (YT, threads, tutorials, blogs), and I encountered some opinions that I read over and over again, but my personal experience says otherwise, so I´ll just present my thoughts, see what you think about it:
a) NPCs in Combat:
You will often hear that combat Zones are kinda frustrating for trying different builds, because NPCs are still said to not receive module damage, so you have to reduce their hull to 0, and nifty, specialised builds will not work. More specifically, they are said to not suffer heat penalty.
I found this not to be true. I built a Combat-AspX specifically to cook the enemy, for kicks and giggles, and it works wonders. Once you manage to overheat them, they go limp and you can pick them apart.
Also, if you kill their thrusters, they´ll drift helplessly, if you pierce their FSD, they´ll have a hard time jumping away, if you bring their Powerplant down, then pierce it again, they´ll explode even if they have hull left.
So what´s going on there? It seems to me, that AI pilots simply don´t need to fiddle with menues and buttons, so they have perfect pip management, and instantaneously switch modules on and off. That´s it, that´s all there is to it. They simply show how much and how long you could potentially fight back if you´re sitting in a smoking wreckage and are about to get beaten to a pulp.
b) Flight controls:
Everyone tells you, you´ll have to learn to fight "Flight assistant – off" for AX and PvP combat.
I have the lurking feeling, that´s not the complete truth. I did start to train FA-off occasionally for landing, docking, and with a joystick button assigned to "hold down", also certain combat maneuvers, but so far, I can´t seem to stay in FA-off for long if it gets busy, before I am hurtling about in uncontrolled random motion.
But I found a way that works for me: I kept the joystick button for "FA off" on "hold", but assigned another joystick button for "toggle alternate flight controls", and in alternate controls, I assigned the joystick axes to translational movement instead of rotation.
I feel, this way, I get the most out of 3 worlds in any given situation. What do you guys think? Anyone tried this? Is it worth learning the motor skills?
c) Loadout and fire groups
You´ll sometimes read that meta builds concentrate on one weapon type, and then stack engineering to maximise this specific effect. I am not sure if this is always the best solution. I like to have a weapon mix on my ships, usually with predominantly thermal weapons (shield strippers) on button 1, and predominantly kinetic weapons (hull bashers) on button 2. Same goes for engineering. My Viper has 2 sturdy cannons, one is High Yield, the other one Thermal Cascade. This ship has only a few small hardpoints, so this way, whatever happens, I will always deal some damage.
I also found that railguns work perfectly fine on the same button with lasers (gimballed or fixed, depending on ship) or MCs: You line up your shot, press the button, rails fire. Then you hold that button down, and the sustained-fire weapons will continue until you drained the capacitor. Release the button, and you´re ready for the next combo sequence. Try rails and lasers on button1, cannon or PAs and MCs on button 2. Different shot speed doesn´t matter, you can walk on your target once the rails fired, and/or between switching buttons/fire groups.
While some people say, you should apply thermal vent on overcharged or short-range lasers for maximum effect, I found it pairs also nicely with long-range. Sure, heat load and damage output is lower, so the efficiency of the venting is lower, but you can start cooling yourself from way off and don´t have to think about falloff. For me, it works nicely for boom-and-zoom-attacks on enemies with shotguns or PAs: charge them while coolig yourself and stripping their shields. You´ll get harder to target once you are in range for them. Then give them a broadside and GTFO. Rinse and repeat.
So where do you think am I totally mistaken? Am I sabotaging myself, or could some of this work in the long run? Does this apply only to PvE, or could I occasionally actually hurt someone in PvP?
