This is 100% text, so be warned. This guide is recommended for players of T2 and up.
So, you’ve mastered the basics of Star Conflict, Cadet. You can shoot, lock, use missiles with decent efficiency and know how to shake off those four ships on your tail. Congratulations, but there’s still a lot more to go!
I’ll be covering things such as roles, resistances and modules. If you have something to add or a correction to make, leave a comment and I’ll add it/fix it. Please contribute: this guide needs an unbiased view of Star Conflict and one person alone cannot do this!
Let’s start off with roles.
For you to understand this, I need to briefly explain classes. Classes are the term I use for the 9 different kinds of ship in Star Conflict. These are as follows:
- Interceptors - Covert Ops , Recon and ECM
- Fighters - Tackler , Gunship and Command
- Frigates - Engineer , Guard and the infamous Long Range
Each of these classes has a different role to play. We’ll skim through them quickly.
- Covert Ops are designed to hunt and kill lone targets. Their Plasma Web deals thermal damage to a target and does not require a line of sight for continued damage. Also uncloaks Recons, other Covert Ops and Tacklers.
- Recon are supposed to scout enemy positions, but can make great hit and run ships. Their Microwarp Engine allows them to get out of sticky situations with minimal fuss.
- ECM are there to disable and inhibit other ship’s systems. Their Tachyon Cocoon completely neutralizes all damage and shorts out all hostile ships’ systems for 2 seconds upon deactivation. Be warned though: if you’re on low health and use this, a well-timed missile shot will kill you off very quickly.
- Tacklers have one purpose: kill all of the above ship classes. More generally, they’re interceptor hunters. Their Chameleon module allows them to sneak up on lone targets and inhibit their movement/increase the damage taken before they can react. Also makes for a great fallback if things go awry. It’s good to note they can wreak havoc on snipers as well.
- Gunships are the brute force of any team. Their overdrive module makes them a DPS monster with plasma cannons equipped and can destroy even Guards in a matter of seconds.
- Command ships buff their allies and are fairly good at tanking - acting as a shield for their teammates. The Diffusion Shield makes them completely invulnerable to damage, but uses a lot of energy per hit.
- Engineers build structures and heal their team members. They’re supposed to stay in out-of-the-way locations where they have little chance of being targeted, but can still help out. The Combat Drones module sacrifices one of the active drones to heal all surrounding allies’ shields for more than 2000 points in a small radius.
- Guards are the tanks of the game. Their Phase Shield grants them 100 points of resistance to one damage type for their shields and can be cycled to counter incoming damage. They have massive survivability, but they are the slowest ships in the game.
- Finally, Long Range frigates help out by sniping enemy vessels with Disintegrators or Guided Torpedoes, doing massive thermal damage per shot. They are the only ships with six turrets, which kicks up their close range DPS considerably.
Resistances
Resistances are fairly simple, when you know how they work. You can view a ship’s resistances by changing the tooltip to ‘Full’ in settings.
Resistances show how good a ship is at taking a certain kind of damage. You have three types of resist: Thermal, Kinetic and EM. Passive modules are available which up a ship’s resistance to one kind of damage to either hull or shields, and the Multiphase Shield Adapter and Nanocomposite Coating increase damage resistance to all types for a short time. The Guard’s Phase Shield also offers and extra 100 points of resistance to their shields, which makes them great at absorbing damage.
The formula for how much damage a weapon does to a ship is as follows:
Damage = Base Damage multiplied by 100 divided by 100 plus resistance to that damage.
Or, for those who are more symbol savvy:
Dmg = DmgB*(100)/(100+DmgR)
DmgB is the base damage of the weapon, and DmgR is the resistance of the ship to that kind of damage. So if you take a hit to your hull by a plasma cannon, the resistance applied would be the hull resistance of that ship to EM damage.
Have I lost you yet? No? Let’s keep going.
Now onto resistance stacking. Stacking is the Star Conflict term for using modules to increase a ship’s resistance to damage from any kind of weapon, over and over again. Stacking is useful until you reach about 100 resistance, and then it becomes pointless to add any more, shown below. If you want extra survivability, you’re better off going with upping the hull or shield strength.
With 100 resistance, you take 50% damage.
With 200 resistance, you take 33% damage.
With 300 resistance, you take 25% damage.
With 400 resistance, you take 20% damage.
Thermal Modulators increase shield resistance to Thermal damage.
EM Diffusors increase shield resistance to EM damage.
Variative Shield Projectors increase shield resistance to Kinetic damage.
Thermal Insulation increases hull resistance to Thermal damage.
EM Insulation increases hull resistance to EM damage.
Reactive Armour increases hull resistance to Kinetic damage.
Having fun yet? Eyes sore? Mine are, but you’ve still got a bit more to go through. Modules, now.
Active and Passive modules are essentially combat programs that help you out in a fight. They do as they say: active modules need user input to function and passives are just on all the time.
Modules are grouped according to Class. There are only two types of active modules that can be used on every ship: Restoration and Survival. They’re fairly self-explanatory. “Hold on!” I hear you cry. “What about the Mass Shield Generator and the Nanodrone Cloud? Aren’t those Restoration modules as well?” Well, no. They’re engineering modules, and so can only be fitted on Engineers.
I’ll leave it up to the community for a module list.
