Maybe I"m just playing them wrong, I play the Fed frigates and have a tier 1, 2 and 3 frigate, but I just get owned in this thing. It’s special ability is battle drones which only fight in close, I play it like brawler with em/laser weaponry but always get out maneuvered. It seems the only Frigates that work are the Empire snipers.
Is it just me? What am I doing wrong. I want to like frigates I really do, help me out here.
I use fed frigates and they make very strong brawlers if used right. Stack up passive mods and skills for turn speed, and defensive stats - you will have enough damage output anyway. When you start getting up close, if a fighter gets on your tail and doesn’t want to leave, just hold afterburner+reverse, without any steering - they’ll overshoot you and you can unload into their tail, which will generally heavily damage or even kill them, at the least forcing them to run away. Vanguard drones are really nice here since they repair your shield/armor giving you a much stronger tank than you’d normally get.
I use fed frigates and they make very strong brawlers if used right. Stack up passive mods and skills for turn speed, and defensive stats - you will have enough damage output anyway. When you start getting up close, if a fighter gets on your tail and doesn’t want to leave, just hold afterburner+reverse, without any steering - they’ll overshoot you and you can unload into their tail, which will generally heavily damage or even kill them, at the least forcing them to run away. Vanguard drones are really nice here since they repair your shield/armor giving you a much stronger tank than you’d normally get.
Really, I didn’t know that. I’ve just recently started using the afterburn reverse techniqute and has been helping. I’m using pulse lasers on my tier 3 frig but am having a killer time hitting anything as the beam bounces around.
One word: Get engine inhibitor. And watch them as they fly like sacks of grain 
I am also interested in the viability of federation frigates. I want to play a brawler frigate and I am currently playing as Empire. I notice one of the biggest changes in going to Fed will be a huge loss in hit points. The empire frigates have tons of tankability - but their special is for long range. I want to be able to drop a warp gate, and boost myself in and start dishing out damage/healing/buffing teammates. Is the Fed frigate good for this? How about the drones? Can they be effectively used for offence or is it better to have repair drones because the federation frigate has less health?
Speaking from the other side of the fight: I mostly use fighters, and I find federation frigs toughest to deal with when they have an engine inhibitor repair drones. The inhibitor is a death sentence to me, since I’m now too slow to avoid being hit with the full 6 guns, and despite the relatively low hit-points, the right modules can make these ships pretty bloody tough. If my overdrive runs out before I can kill them, my chances get severely slim.
Empire frigates don’t usually bring inhibitors, although god knows why… They are easier to deal with however, as their manoeuvrability is awful, on the odd occaision that I do use them myself, I find they tend to be wasted just sniping at the back the whole time. As long as you keep a few wingmen in sight, empire frigates can be powerful battering rams.
Jericho frigates are for people who hate fun, you will spend your time camping behind the biggest rock you can find and spamming guided missiles. Again, a total waste as these are almost as tough as the empire frigates but they’re a lot more manoeuvrable. You can do more damage up close than you can from afar.
The frigate that has the repair drones, they are both offense and repair - when your shield is under 50% they change to repair mode, when above 50% they attack nearby hostiles.
As for survivability, I haven’t had problem killing the sniper/missile frigates once you get on top of them - perhaps because I have it fitted for brawler (lots of turning/defensive stats) with midrange assault plasma for good dps, but generally it’s a solid ship.
Once you get the 25% turning passive and some skills for turning, especially the 75% nose up/down, the difference is huge, and it handles like a fighter
Don’t forget that, cruise missiles, lucky shots, and Jericho torpedoes will destroy your Drones…
Also, that 75% is NOT nose up/down, it is a boost for LATERAL movement; strafing up and down, left and right that is.
I play my fed frigate with long range plasma canon , usually i guard station/beacon or protect/support teammate.
Personnaly i deal with interceptor by using minefield and pulsar( i dont know if its the exact name , the mod doing dmg to ennemy ship in x range around the ship)
Anyway by the time they reach me their shield is down , 2 charged shot of long range plasma canon wipe the shield
I’m pretty sure there is a skill that gives 75% to nose pitch up/down. And it is definitely noticable - if you want to do a quick 180 and spin your mouse behind you, the ship will tilt sideways and pich nose up, instead of flat turn, since that is now the fastest way of it turning. It does this automatically. It is something like rank 5?? fed skill (can’t get ingame right now to check). One of the other factions perhaps have lateral movement, but that one is definitely nose pitch.
Empire frigates don’t usually bring inhibitors, although god knows why…
Well now I know I will Thanks for that.
I’m pretty sure there is a skill that gives 75% to nose pitch up/down. And it is definitely noticable - if you want to do a quick 180 and spin your mouse behind you, the ship will tilt sideways and pich nose up, instead of flat turn, since that is now the fastest way of it turning. It does this automatically. It is something like rank 5?? fed skill (can’t get ingame right now to check). One of the other factions perhaps have lateral movement, but that one is definitely nose pitch.
Nope, it is lateral movement.
Nope, it is lateral movement.
It is indeed, I tried it after you wrote it earlier in the thread and it does boost horizontal and vertical strafe.
Yeah, the description is kinda wonky. I was wondering what was that 75% bonus, had to compare the “green bonuses” after grabbing them one after another.
So I’ve tried another setup on my Anaconda mark III fed frigate, although it is basically a bad version of the Empire sniper frig. I’ve got long range lasers, with the 13% enhanced optics module. It keeps me from having to maneuver and I’ve been having a lot of luck with it. However, I fee like I should just be using a Empire frigate though. sigh…
Just tell they grow up (tier 5) you will retract your mean statement
/poor ducklings.
Just tell they grow up (tier 5) you will retract your mean statement
/poor ducklings.
What do you know that we peons don’t? Tester are we?
Can anyone share a tier II/III frig set up with me that works for them?
I play a t3 federation support frigate (anaconda mkII) the way I think it’s meant to be played: as a buffer/debuffer and this works really well for me.
I use defensive modules to increase resi on hull and shield capacity as well as shield recharge rate. I’m at ~13.5k shields and 8k hull with extra emp resi mod for shield.
The Anaconda Mk II has 4(!!) active mod slots, which I fitted with the shield and hull recharge mods for me and my allis around me (I bought the premium ones because they give 4000m!! range) as well as weapon inhibitor and missile defense mod.
I have these 4 active all the time without having energy issues thanks to the 20% faster energy recharge mod I equipped as well.
As weapons I run the plasma sniper with +dmg and needler mods. As secondary I have minefield and the rockets that disable enemy weapons and mods for 2.5 sec.
With this setup I’m pretty hard to kill thanks to all the regen from mods and my drones. I try to stay close to my allies to provide as many buffs as possible, help winning duels or prevent my teamcaptain from being gunned down by warpgate interceptors (weapon inhibitor really helps here)
In domination I try to hide out of sight near contested beacons to support my mates capping with mines and healing.
For me this is a very satisfying playstyle knowing that my presence alone wins team fights. I focus on surviving, that’s why using terrain to break line of sight against snipers is important as is always to position myself in a way that allows me to buff as many teammates as possible.
This way it’s easy to earn 20+ assists
and a high score in a match if you play well.
I play a very tanky frigate. Mine is rank 6 (Tier 2) Empire. It has over 33,000 hit points with hull+shield. It is very slow, and I constantly have hull regeneration for me and my allies. I also like to use is the warp gate. It’s soooo useful. I use it to get into battle, and to escape.
Even if my ship dies, I often help in a huge way on the battlefield because 3 things are happening when I’m there
A) I’m healing all my allies
B) I’m dishing out tons of damage with 6 rapid fire pulse lasers.
C) Enemies start focusing on killing ME. And with 33K health + regen, it takes a long time.
Point C) is important, and it’s helped in many situations. this is because while enemies focus on the long job of killing me, it gives my teammates the chance to just destroy the enemy swarm. Even if I die, by the time I’m dead, the enemy team has lost more than 1 ship that was trying to kill me. Trading a handful of interceptors/fighters for 1 tanky frigate is usually a loss for the enemy, and helps us complete objectives.