Best Shield in Elite Dangerous

[@thatbrianguy1594]

Seriously...you need to be imported as a hidden engineer in the game.

[@cquek77]

the best engineer of the game is apparently in KZbin :D

[@infn8loopmusic]

Definitely! I hope Fdev does this

[@TehPaws3D]

For all your service to the elite dangerous community, you deserve an award, It would be easy to horde data for yourself in a game like this, Thank you so much for your contribution.

[@endsinvention1390]

He now has his own station!

[@TehPaws3D]

@@endsinvention1390 Woah, where? What's it called?

[@jakedanger99]

Agreed, i love this guy's videos. I'll click on others as well for extra input but i always make sure to watch his when i have questions.

[@ParoxyDM]

"Realistically you're not taking damage 100% of the time." Me and my Type-9 would like to disagree with that.

[@chrisklitou7573]

Upgrade to a T10

[@no1baggiefan]

@@chrisklitou7573 same shit lol

[@chrisklitou7573]

@@no1baggiefan same shit? My T10 has 9200 hull and 2000 Sheilds

[@no1baggiefan]

@@chrisklitou7573 9000 ?

[@MrTimjm009]

@@no1baggiefan Not tested it but might be possible . My T 10 has 3000 shields and 6000 hull

[@DerekMoore82]

So best Shield setup in the game: - Prismatic, Reinforced, High Cap. - Boosters: (x3) Resistance Augmented, Thermal Block. - Extra Boosters: Heavy Duty, Super Capacitors.

[@fuhk-er-ee]

Thanks for the cliff notes.

[@camilompz5627]

Thank you mate

[@grayowl1702]

Thank you

[@lucifermorningstar4503]

Thanks

[@Flyingboots1]

If I swapped out the prismatic for a bi-weave with fast charge would the booster setup still be the same?

[@aaronperkins2880]

If FDev don't add a science officer NPC in your honor, I'mma be mad.

[@emilyhofland8219]

Does voice attack have him?

[@jellowiggler]

@@emilyhofland8219 That would be great. He's going to have to run a few thousand lines in the studio though....

[@thurguud]

best comment by far

[@Monody512]

0:12 Did… Did someone just launch a seismic charge at that Corvette?

[@mikkdc]

I noticed that too and wondered what it was :D

[@1creeperbomb]

"If it can blow up asteroids, it should definitely work against this Corvette!"

[@Monody512]

@@1creeperbomb *Boing* "...Never mind."

[@austineberhart8535]

@@1creeperbomb let me target modules with those!

[@Hiniberus]

Tbh, I'd really want to see that be possible :D when shields are down anyways.

[@adejones2340]

wow, a month of free time to show us the results of your software testing, really appreciate your time doing this, looks spot on to me Astro o7..Thank you

[@huggiesunrise]

Dude ive appreciated your hard work on this game, doing tutorials, and seriously this is totally over the top.!

[@junkfilter77]

My whole Elite Dangerous playlist / save for later folder is basically this channel.

[@ZirconX1]

So. Elite community having a lot of issues figuring out the best "in most situations" shields arguing back and forth between fast recharge bi weaves or prismatics with highest HP possible. Conflict lasts for years with people arguing their points back and forth. DTEA: "Hmmm....I'll make a program that will calculate every possible combo for shield types and all their engineering to see what the maths say" Program: "Yeah STFU the best shield setup in the game:- Prismatic, Reinforced, High Cap.- Boosters: x3 Resistance Augmented, Thermal Block.- Extra Boosters: Heavy Duty, Super Capacitors. That'll do the trick in 90% of the situations. When you hit thargoids here's a second build. Anything else is wrong and you should feel bad for having it K BYE" *Entire community claps in unison* There it is. The answer to shields. That program mathematically laid down the fucking law.

[@mateuszk23]

The fact you had the dedication to make such a video big props, I'm relatively new to the game so these types of videos are really helpful and to see someone put in so much work is really praiseworthy.

[@markdudevad]

Beautiful program! I can't wait to see the breakdown, I am also a software developer, thanks for sharing the code and working on a video to break it down. Reading it will be lots of fun, I'm glad we have that in common!

[@Enakaji]

Thanks for that, your little app really did help me optimize my build. One upside of boosting resistances instead of raw shield is that the shield recarge stays nice and low. With my old setup my absolute shield values for each resistance was basically the same as now but the recharge was almost twiche as it is now with the optimized setup. My little Keelback now has total shieldvalues of 727 explosive, 560 kinetic and 605 thermal with a recovery of only 2:30 on bi weave wich is really nice as before it was over 5 minutes.

[@Jack-Wall]

Perfect timing .... it's always worth dropping into your videos to find out what positive madness you are up to. Kudos

[@no1baggiefan]

WOW That, is dedicated research, you don't play elite, your living it, much respect, love your videos.

[@hrruben5135]

Thank you for your effort, CMDR. o7

[@jamaicster]

You are genius man!!!! It is only true love for science and game can make such videos appear! Wow.... guys... This video from D2EA has melted my heart =) Thank you!

[@LIntouchableChannel]

The problem with this is that it's a bad shield set up. - Ignores the benefits of MJs with pips - No real-life testing - PAs exist - Again, pips and MJs - Fast Charge???

[@LIntouchableChannel]

@Crazy Monkey Good point, let me clarify: MJs = 'megajoules' ; the amount of shield hitpoints. MJs are your only protection against absolute damage (damage that ignores resistances). The reason I mentioned pips is that with 4 pips to SYS (systems capacitor), the shield strength is basically multiplied by 2.3~ times - so a shield with 1000MJs will have 2300 MJs with 4 pips instead of 0. You can see here why having MJs is important then, because the difference ends up being multiplied. PAs = 'plasma accelerators' ; a very popular and powerful weapon which does a large amount of 'absolute' damage. These are a factor because they will essentially negate the resistances of the shields in this video. All of the shields presented in this vid are sub optimal in any realistic scenario. Even if a single small ship npc is shooting at you, a settup that uses 6 boosters (4 heavy duty and two resistance) and 2 heatsinks can fit a lot of shield cell banks which will regen the shields back.

[@fakenewts1031]

@@LIntouchableChannel It also doesn't take into account cap drain or pip pressure at all either. Any player who's ever flown a hybrid build will know how difficult it is to keep your SYS juiced while also putting PAs downrange and permaboosting. "Use reinforced biweaves with fast charge! It's optimal!" Um... yeah, no. No thanks.

[@LIntouchableChannel]

@@fakenewts1031 Yeah this too... on a big ship no less, which will be taking constant fire.

[@KirstenBayes]

Yay, Team Powershell represent! Really interesting numbers!

[@Saybin]

Extremely well done. Just getting back into the game after almost three years and to see this heart and soul invested is why I'm invested in sticking with Elite. Its too bad I can't get you gold or something on KZbin.

[@RealBadMike]

Pretty sure this is the video that made me subscribe. Just came back for a refresher and once again this vid is gold - thank you so much.

[@ij1376]

It took you a month of in depth analysis to find the best shield configuration?... Subscribed. You deserve it.

[@edgepixel8467]

Some people tinker for a day in Coriolis. Others spend a month making a program.

[@agingerbeard]

"I spent month of my free time... it's open source." Love people like you thanks for yoyr effort and for sharing!

[@CheShirrr2911]

Man you're the best! I really admire your dedication and efforts put into making this particular research and all the Elite Dangerous subject. Bravo!

[@1creeperbomb]

Wow an entire powershell tool? Great work!!!

[@davidgouyaie8027]

Your spot on the next incoming engineer in elite is assure..

[@Arctic_Fox_NFFC]

OK I have run a number of tests on different ships and builds and here are my comments/critiques: Program almost always recommends Prismatic Shields. Problem is: - Prismatics ADD WEIGHT reducing boost speed of ships thus increasing the damage effectiveness of opponents (time on target). If I switch to Prismatic + Heavy/Super Boosters (these weigh 14T vs 3.5T) in my Krait Phantom I can lose 10 m/s of top speed which could be the difference in escaping a fast pursuer like FDL or FAS. - Prismatics use more power vs regular or bi-weaves which could tip a build from 99.8% power consumption to 104% deployed. This results in sacrifices elsewhere changing Power Plant from Armoured to Overcharged or Thermal Spread to Monstered etc, disabling modules etc to accommodate the PSG. - Not all players have access to Prismatics anyway. In the words of Yamiks you got to pray four weeks to Space Khaleesi first. I can see that v1.1 implements the means to exclude Prismatics but it seems to involve adding something to the command line parameters or other that is beyond my technical competence, and I was brave enough to download and test the program. Please can you add the option to the config file. Anyone running this in windows has just about the technical competence to double click 'START_TEST' and edit ShieldTestConfig in Notepad. Average layman does not understand running this from DOS Prompt or whatever is expected. We have a program that thinks Prismatic is almost the universal solution but Prismatics are an end game module and this means the program is not useful to CMDR's who are less Elite and just want to make decisions between Regular/BiWeave and what type of boosters at earlier stage of the game when kitting out a new ship. You mention that you looked hard for a problem in the code as the results didn't 'feel' right. The issue is that most CMDR's seek to balance out resistances to be ready to face all challenges. Your own builds like Cucumber stress this. Problem with this program is that you can say "I take 60DPS thermal, 40DPS Kinetic, 0DPS absolute, 0DPS explosive" and it computes you the perfect build for that but the one time you're facing someone with PA's or missiles/torps you've sacrificed so much absolute strength / Explosive Resistance that you're gonna get wrecked. So you may improve your efficiency in 95% of scenarios but in that 5% you are going to die instead of not dying. You are making SS Titanic the absolute fastest best unsinkable ship as long as an iceberg doesn't gash three compartments. I would rather have a shield that is 20% less effective day-to-day but doesn't have an achilles heel. Also it seems that changes in booster types can (for example) lose you 7500 efffective kinetic HP to gain you 1500 thermal. This happens when you go from Resistance Augmented to Thermo Block, or even (to a lesser extent) when you change out a Res/Thermo for a Heavy/Super. Now unless you've put into the program that you're taking more than 5:1 thermal damage it won't do that. So the result is that the configurations lead to virtually eliminating kinetic damage at the cost of uncomfortably low thermal resistances in some cases. Ironically, what it's saying is, if you take balanced damage Kinetic/Thermo, don't strive for balanced resistance when you can block out Kinetic so much easier. It feels counter intuitive. Maybe it's right, I don't know, but I don't feel comfortable flying a ship with much lower Thermal resistance than Kinetic when I expect most attacks to be Thermal... Overall this program is still a masterpiece and to get it for free is amazing. But what it has taught me is that, if you look at shields in a complete vacuum, against an enemy that is always uniform and predictable, and you have no sacrifices to make in terms of weight or module slots or power, if shield tanking is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING to you then this will give you the perfect loadout. However, expect to feel uncomortable when you read it. Because the game is inifinitely more complex and unpredictable than that. And thank God it is. Those Resistance/Thermo Boosters though... who'd have thought?

[@DowntoEarthAstronomy]

Thanks alot for your feedback. A lot of it has been resolved in later later versions. It has even been made into an online version to make it easier to use cmdrstoolbox.com/shield-tester

[@sinntaxdagreat]

I remember watching this back in the day. Glad it finally wiggled back into my feed

[@ceard]

Thanks for the program and the video. I will give it a try for sure. Just a small suggestion: add a readme to the Git repository with a link to this video.

[@brianhanna3128]

Judging the efficacy by the amount of time you've put into this that's a pretty definitive deep dive - and not an A rated in sight! Impressive work, thanks Cmdr! o7

[@XShaneX19]

Prismatics are all A rated (and such a pain in the butt for PVP combined with the reboot exploit)

[@SemNome-ds1qy]

@@XShaneX19 what exploit?

[@XShaneX19]

@@SemNome-ds1qy Hmm stupid wording on my part. It's not really that of an exploit but you can get 50% of your downed shield back with rebooting your ship. Even works with highly engineered prismatics which wouldn't go online in a lifetime on normal recharge. Ofc while rebooting you are totally at the mercy of your enemy but if you have the hull to spare it can be a game changer in a fight.

[@Phalanx443]

D2EA, what you do for the ED community, and the level of support you bring to this game, is nothing short of astounding! I love you! (but in a manly-man, doing manly things, in a manly "bro"-type way.. (if you get this reference, I'm buying you a beer, or several.. likely several..)) 😁

[@jellowiggler]

Wow, D2EA. Nice work! So good. This is what makes this community the best!

[@far-outman1730]

Agreed, Oh My Broother! Can’t even begin to tell you how appreciated all your hard work and dedication is. YOU’RE THE MAN! Many thanks, Dude.

[@Zod_JB]

I know I’m a bit late to this video (newly minted Cmdr), but this was clearly a labor of love. Your enthusiasm and passion for this game, really shows. You’ve absolutely earned a long term subscriber here. I eagerly look forward to future content, as your my new “Go-to” for Elite Dangerous information.

[@conner8528]

I think we'd love a programming video from you!

[@shushumaru0]

i'd 2nd that

[@emilyhofland8219]

You've shown me, I've been wrong on Shields quite often. But my fdl, has bi weave, thermal, fast charge... They only ship I use for combat, that's hard to keep under sustained fire.

[@Kaethena]

So does mine :) And she can take out a wing of 4 Spec Ops ships in a High Intensity CZ with relative ease. It's not so much a case of being wrong as it is finding what works for you based on how you fly. The FDL has the speed and agility to get out of sustained fire most times, in PvE anyway. With engineered thrusters she can put distance between you and any non-player ship in seconds. Don't automatically think you're wrong because your setup is different. :)

[@emilyhofland8219]

@@Kaethena omg yes! I been bitching about my large ships not killing as fast. I wish I could give the FDL better longevity.

[@T0rrente18]

@@Kaethena I no longer need to use scb in my anaconda when doing high cz, i went for bi weave, thermal resistant, fast charge. Two shield boosters with the boost modification (dont remember the name) and four with resistance augmented. I also have 2 class 5 guardian shield boosters.

[@Kaethena]

@@emilyhofland8219 Sometimes longevity isn't based on how much punishment you can sustain. My FDL has about 1600mj Shields, give or take, and about 57% resistance to each damage type. Compared to the big battleships that is relatively not a lot of defence. However, she has HUGE speed. As soon as you get a bunch of ships shooting at you... the thing to do is you get the hell out of there. Pick your fights. Even in Conflict Zones. Never just sit there and let several ships fire on you. That's suicide. Use your ship's advantages. She isn't a battleship. She's a bat out of hell. Get some distance, choose your target, and take it out without other ships shooting at you. You'll find you have a much easier time. Corvettes, Cutters, Type 10-s and Anacondas... sure, they can sit there all day. But they cost 3x+ more than your FDL. They couldn't move out of the way if they wanted to. They're like trying to move a fat person by putting a couple of hairdryers on them. :P The FDL is nimble and fast. Use that as your defence. They can't hit you if they can't catch you. And in CZs, you only have to get a few KM distance before ships lose interest. Then you just pick your target and terminate with extreme prejudice. :) Don't fly a smaller ship like a bigger ship, that's how you deal with it. Use what they have. :)

[@Kaethena]

@@T0rrente18 No, I only ever use an SCB on my stealth ships, because they have the spare power to fit one since their shields are so low. It's more a "just in case" thing. I go for Bi-Weave, Thermal Resistant, Fast Charge on almost all my ships, unless it's a specialised build. It has never let me down one time. I haven't lost a ship in almost 3 years.

[@JudgeMarek]

You are a very insightful fellow, thank you for your contributions to our experiences.

[@cpt.fisher7836]

You have my huge respect, thanks alot! esp for that software and scientific approach

[@SeemtexX]

Hmm, been only off by one Thermal Block on my Corvette build - but it's nice to be confirmed I guess. Really good work, CMDR! o7

[@XKLefevre]

This is truly amazing work, I think I'm going to shop some DTEA swag to contribute

[@KitfoxNinja]

Glad I already was running basically this. It makes sense tbh if you are use to min maxing in many games.

[@zourin8804]

I've become a big fan of low draw experimental effects on shields, because it makes more optimal use of the power going in to recharge the shields. Bi-weaves are useless if your capacitor bottoms out. This is something the 'math' overlooks, and that is how long you can sustain the recharge rate of the shields in an engagement. it's like looking only at the dps and fire rate of a machine gun and ignoring the downtime caused by frequent jamming. I'm all for bi-weave, low draw, resistance mods on my shield tank ships like the Courier, simply because it's far more optimal use of capacitor power flow in a sustained engagement. If i'm going to get hammered so hard my shields break, it's probably not going to make that huge a difference whether I'm using bi-weaves or thicc bois at that point due to combat assymetry. Fast charge bi-weaves may be better for armor tanks merely for the break recovery rate, simply because any protective coat over my paint is better than none, and who cares about the shield capacitor in a Federal Doorstop anyway.

[@Nazz-b7p]

You making your program to figure all of this out, got me into programming! Thanks :) Learning Python. Very challenging for me as I suck at Mathematics lol xD

[@DaScorp]

What the hell, guy, you are soooo genius, your passion is unbelievable. @fdev, pick this guy!

[@marcinos303]

Awesome pro-tip ;) I always use bi-weave shield to 1vs1 duell.

[@davidperry5697]

It would be quite interesting to be able to generate a graph of the crossover point between bi-weave and prismatic, resulting in a plot of damage vs %time damage taken, above the line would be prismatic and below bi-weave.

[@davidperry5697]

That would be a 3d graph, so above and below the plane, but you could do 2d with one of the variables fixed.

[@herardpique7302]

came to the same conclusion booster-wise, only by checking variants in Excel. but Prismatics - Thermal Resistance - High Cap is the best in terms of balance between more hp from SCBs if you`re having less raw shield hp, and more raw shield hp for survival.

[@vinigarr801]

I subbed jus from the intro... That dedication deserves so.

[@Hiniberus]

I'm pretty new to the game relatively speaking but I always thought reinforced biweave fast charge was a good idea with mostly resistance augmented boosters. Good to know I was partly right!

[@omarsyed1980]

This just insane. But brilliant. Putting that much effort into a shield efficiency calculator. Just goes to show that us gamers are a different breed of human.

[@Benth3rdoneth4t]

Keep up the nice work! You should update the script to take the ship's power distributor and pip management into consideration.

[@fuhk-er-ee]

this

[@TheSHJGaming]

Honestly love the effort put into this video. I don't know why I hadn't subbed to you sooner.

[@mrb6144]

The universe just got stronger, great content again Astro 07

[@wmgthilgen]

With all you do and have done, where do you find the time to do anything new? Your a "GOD"!!!

[@jochenschmidt1072]

Thank you so much for all of your work in elite. :)

[@moldiworp9143]

Holy crap lad this has been a lot of effort. Good show, Captain o7

[@WingManFang1]

Before I actually watch this I wanted to say I put 6A Prismatic Shields on my combat Krait Mk II and gave them Thermal resistance and heat resistance reinforced engineering, I haven’t had a chance to test them though but given my luck and build it’s likely for the best.

[@Sir-Complains-a-Lot]

wow. you are the biggest ed nerd ever. there should be an "down to astronomy port" somewhere... huge respects for your time and effort put into this.

[@kinghavox2011]

That was alot of math. Thank you for you sacrifice of so much of your free time. Commanders like you are the ones who keeps guys like us interested in this game o7!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@MrTimjm009]

On my Vulture Im using G5 thermal Bi weave with multi weave effect . Then 2 x boosters with heavy duty super caps

[@godmode9913]

You are the elite guru. Thank you for your work.

[@greatdanexlks]

Love your work! Great job Commander!

[@hyzwar]

Love Your approach to things. This one is very helpfull! Cheers 😉

[@ShadowKick32]

I did all that calculation a year ago and got similar results for my corvette. Though I have some different results. I went for a lot of thermal res. I'm not sure I got the best thing anymore, I lack the data. But no way i'm doing all this again, especially the 4 weeks to get prismatic. My current shield has survived a 1v8 in conflict zones. I think it's good enough.

[@darkerriddick4996]

Interesting. My corvette is running reinforced prismatic with hi-cap, 70% heavy duty boosters with thermal block and 30% thermal resistant boosters with thermal block and I get 6000mj of shields with perfectly balanced resistances.

[@BodyHammer83]

Thank's man for sacrificing your time for us!

[@b.delacroix7592]

Funny, I think this is exactly what I have on my cutter. It was put together for thargoid interceptor fighting.

[@b.delacroix7592]

@Crazy Monkey VS non cz npcs, I can last forever (or so it seems). Simulation says 23 minutes to take down the shield. Vs thargoids, well that's different. I've been killing cyclops for a while and mostly that is technique over build, though build helps. Vs CZ npcs, you have to be more careful, but there is quite a bit of buffer. Never been attacked by ALL Spec Ops at once, though.

[@Verbias]

This is one of the coolest ED videos i've ever seen :D Thank you !!!

[@Kaethena]

I don't think I would personally use any of the results that you came up with. There are a lot of variables you haven't taken into account. How much recharge your distributor can handle, how long it's likely to take to kill your target, how good you are as a pilot, your flying style (whether you're aggressive or defensive, or somewhere inbetween), how good the NPCs are that you're going to be fighting (engineered pirates and spec op wings will be way different to HazRes ships of the same type) how much endurance you want your ship to have... and you have to input what you're likely to be shot with when a good deal of the time you have absolutely no idea because a lot of the time it's completely random. I find the thermal resistances on most of those results considerably lower than what I'd personally be happy with (considering lasers are the more accurate weapons in the hands of NPCs), and the other two resistances far higher than I've ever found necessary. And personally I feel that anything short of a prismatic frontloaded damage sponge shouldn't have Reinforced on their shields, simply because it increases the drain on your distributor meaning your shields will be recharging MUCH more slowly for more of the time, especially with Fast Charge on them (which seems counterintuitive but go try it. Your distro is out of juice more than it isn't). This is a bigger problem the smaller the ship you're using since they have smaller distributors. Then there's SCB's, for which a health based setup kind of destroys their usefulness. There's a lot of stuff you have to consider and honestly this seems kind of one tracked in the approach, purely focusing on which shield combination can resist whatever damage values you've put in, when everything else isn't a factor. Which is... well, it's kind of simplistic. What you've done is pretty cool, but honestly I wouldn't rely on this program for my builds. The results don't fit my own testing beyond general theories which are basically common sense (if you know you're gonna get shot at a lot, fit more hitpoints on your shields... if you have more downtime focus more on resistance and recharge etc). I mean that's a no brainer. However your resistance setup is entirely different. It probably works for you, and that's great. But I don't think it will work for everyone. You are right about one thing though, Super Capacitors aren't a good choice to use in most cases. As an example of something that goes against everything your program says should be the case... my Stealth Cutter has about 1200 Mj shield health, with roughly 60% balanced resistances, yet her SCB restores her entire shield PER use. IF she even gets shot at. From 1% to full in a single use. Because she's built that way. You have to think about these things. There isn't a one size fits all for the "best" shield to use. I think you'd be better off teaching people how to fish, as it were, rather than throwing fish at them. But as I said before, I can appreciate what you've done and you've put a lot of work into it. Even if I don't necessarily agree with the findings. So kudos for that. :)

[@Z3rath]

8:20 those damage type indicators at the top (Explosive/Kinetic/Thermal) - Those are from EVE's UI with the EM type edited out xD Nice sim software tho, enjoying your videos! Keep up the good work Cmdr o7

[@jasonprice800]

This so good it goes completely over my head.

[@MrTimjm009]

Dont know if its just me but , It occurs to me that if you have a re inforced high cap , then it focuses more on kinetic and explosive damage . So you would need thermo block as an effect on the shield and also on the boosters since it is compensating for the lack of thermo resistance . ( It is trying to balance out all types of damage resistence ) If you then built a Thermal resistant shield then you could then have hicap boosters since now , it needs more hit points ( The overall hit points on a thermal shield is lower than a re inforced shield )

[@FlintlockEngineering]

Really, really impressive work!! I've been a fan for a long time. Bravo!!

[@martintownley5803]

I wonder why the results swung from one extreme (bi-weaves) to the other (prismatics) and never gave normal shields in the results?

[@karadan100]

Dude, you're really smart. Great channel.

[@washedup_adventurer]

Interesting. After going from a corvette to krait mk2, I noticed my typical shield mods weren't working. So I've been running bi-weave reinforced similar to this video and it seemed to be acceptable at least. but this gives me some credence.

[@simonwillis1529]

Ok Iv been away to long Impressive sir well done and the time taken

[@thurguud]

Would love to see included shield cell banks and guardian shield reinforcement modules. I would suppose that cell banks will tend to function better with high resistance instead of heavy duty and shield reinforcements would tend to work better with bi weave fast charge. I was running the numbers in my conda a few days ago, with shield cell banks used i gain an extra 400 shield health because of the resistances if i go full resistance augmented to 60+% no heavy duty, but x2 heavy duty 50+%resistance adds aprox 300 extra constant shield health compared to full resistance. I would like to know wich combination is better if we factor in the recharge rate and the manuverability of the ship. Also would like to know if a prismatic is still worth it after adding some guardian shield reinforcements, even in a slow ship.

[@envysart797]

So for PVP or trade ships the prismatic high cap build, I still think for PvE and and anti-xeno you would want to build a bit differently. The recharge time on high cap prismatic is just that absurd xD

[@crashmaster26]

Every time you use Write-Host, god kills a puppy

[@optionsguai]

I really liked this video. Two Thumbs Up.

[@AeciusthePhilosopher]

This does kinda assume you're looking for combat. I'm actually curious what the 100% efficiency would look like, to simulate failing to evade an interdiction in a freighter like the type-9. (Since that is the sort of situation where you can be expecting all your combat time to be time in which you are getting shot at.) EDIT: I suppose it'll be similar to other "High time on target" results there, so reinforced high-cap prismatics with heavy-duty capacitors and resistance augmented thermal blocks is a likely result.

[@mikedimimd]

Thank you btw Dave. Great vis as always

[@paulcolliss2979]

Great video. Thanks for your work

[@keithlillis7962]

Excellent work and many thanks

[@loganbates2657]

This is just awesome I always enjoy your videos I'm thinking if buying a 2nd anaconda until I get ranked for the vette for my main combat ship atm my anaconda on it's way to colonia thank you again for your great videos

[@thurguud]

i have two anacondas, one called jumpconda to travel long distances without exploring, the other called warriorconda for multipurpose. Same happened with type 9, have one for painite mining, a different one for max cargo + jumprange. I do not like to be constantly changing the modules

[@loganbates2657]

@@thurguud exactly switching modules is just annoying I use a krait for double panite and python for deep core however I'm thinking of a type10 for double panite mining recently

[@thurguud]

@@loganbates2657 I thought about using a type10 for painite, even did a build in coriolis but the greed got the best of me. The type9 is not as defendable, the type10 is way better when you need to defend yourself. BUT the type 9 has soooooo much cargo space, in a type10 i could only fit cargo for 200 millions worth of painite. In a type 9 i carry more than 400 millions in each trip, i supply the lack of defense with mine launchers, with the thruster disruption upgrade and with the sensor disruption+ heat generation. If i get into a fight i cannot win with the mining lances and the fighter (almost any fight other than ring NPC pirates), i spam mines in the direction he is chasing me, trying to fuck his thrusters, sensors and overheat his weapons, boost as much as i can and try to jump. My thought process was: if i die extra less than 30% of the times compared to the number of times i would have probably died in a type 10 (extra trip+ rebuy+just in case) it is still worth it in time and money. I mean if i die 99 of every 100 with a type9 while only die 1 of every 100 trips in a type 10 it is not worth a type 9. But if i die 30 of every 100 trips with a type 9 that i would had survived in a type 10 it is worth it. Also use a phyton for deep core but lately i find painite more relaxing and time efficient. With a big ship in painite, every minute including the trip to the ring and to sell it, is worth a lot of money and it is so easy. Edit: trying to explain better the mess of the tought process

[@yalta99]

Reassured that my general build Corvette used a build pretty close to your very clever code suggested

[@austinm5630]

4:44 Not surprised about Thermo Block, actually. My shield setup is always Thermo Black Grade 4 on the actual shield generator, (sometimes bi-weave, sometimes D grade) then a mix of heavy duty super caps and resist aug thermo block on the boosters. Why? - Grade 4 on the shield generator because Grade 5 takes too much away from kinetic resist. Grade 4 is the most balanced. - Heavy Duty with Super Capacitor because...obvious, isn't it? On most medium ships, split 2 and 2 between this and Resistance Aug. - Resistance Aug boosters with Thermo Block for the remaining boosters. In my own testing, you want to get to 60% resistance against both thermal and kinetic. Any more costs too much, any less is leaving too much potential resistance on the field. On most ships, this can be done with the 2/2 split. - On small ships shield tanks aren't usually viable but the Imperial Courier can easily rack up 2,000mj (effective, not absolute) even though it's a small ship if you throw in some Guardian boosters and the 2/2 split. Source: Throwing together over a thousand builds on Coriolis for the Imperial Courier, Dolphin, both Kraits, Anaconda, and Imperial Clipper. Yes, 1,000 builds between these 6 ships. Anyway tyvm D2A for this. I wish you had done it a year ago, could've saved me several hundred hours, but damn bro, nice work!

[@Solrac-Siul]

Actually the courier can have more than 2000 absolute mj. in fact i think my absolute max is slight above 2300, with pre eng revamp prismatic shield and E boosters ( that have 45 % and 2.8 resists overall) , what means with no negative resists. It is an incredible tank that has ripped many larger ships online, sometimes face tanking them.

[@austinm5630]

@@Solrac-Siul Absolutely, but the problem is that, with Prismatics, you're adding too much weight for optimal 3A Performance Enhanced Engines to work well. For the extra 380mj of shielding it's not worth the loss of agility. Better to run around 2k mj and just outrun anything that might get through the shielding. But yes, absolutely, it CAN do better than 2k. Now, if you're running a courier with zero guns (maybe for actual courier missions, heh) then sure, 100% viable. But even with 3x Grade 5 Lightweight guns, Prismatics just eat too much weight.

[@PetesCreativeRecycling]

I would have liked to see some medium ships used for this... as only large ships have that many utility mounts. How does it change when you only have 2 or 4?

[@Kaethena]

With a medium ship you're sometimes better off thinking about sacrificing a slot for active defenses, such as Chaff, or a Heatsink. Depending on the ship, it can be hard to build for a pure shield tank build. Chaff can sometimes mitigate much more damage than an extra shield booster. It depends how you fly, and how much you remember to use them. You also have to take into account the size of your distributor and how you have it engineered, to work out how your shields will perform.

[@PetesCreativeRecycling]

@@Kaethena Umm cool. I've got over 3000 hours in this game. I just want to know what his program spits out. He does have the source code open, and I'm a software engineer, so I could just look at it myself I suppose.

[@ULTIMBANGA]

The problem with Bi-weave + Fast charge is that you can't have enough power in your distibutor to fill up the shield continuously. Especially on big ships. Are you agree with me ?

[@austineberhart8535]

a big ship is going to run more than 2 boosters; I think my vulture has 2 boosters.

[@nickm6751]

I only need 2 pips in sys to get full recharge in my vette

[@Kaethena]

Depends on your loadout. The best form of defense is attack. Ships can't shoot you if they're in a million pieces. I've found fitting Bi-Weaves with fast charge allows for fitting more powerful weaponry with the spare power, meaning the shields don't need to be constantly recharging for as much of the time, because what you're fighting is space dust a lot quicker. It's a bit of a balancing act and finding what works around your flying style.

[@RichardAdkins]

I'm finding it very difficult to locate a source for a 7A Prismatic Shield Generator. I use INARA but, everywhere it sends me, they have none.

[@DowntoEarthAstronomy]

Have you done your 4 week to unlock them?

[@RichardAdkins]

@@DowntoEarthAstronomy Someone just explained that to me. I'm working on it now. sigh.

[@RichardAdkins]

Any comment on Shield Cell Banks and which Engineering and Experimental to put on them?

[@InquisitorHades]

Thankyou for this work cmdr! o7

[@Kai19103]

AMAZING. you sir are a treasure. 07 Astro.

[@SledgeFox]

Thank you for all your interesting Videos!

[@austineberhart8535]

Did you put mass calculations into this or is it just focused on shield HP? I'd prefer res. aug/thermal block SB over HD because the HD ones are 14t each. res.aug doens't increase the mass does it? I actually like this better

[@DowntoEarthAstronomy]

The shield generator is only Affected by hull mass, modules dose not count

[@austineberhart8535]

@@DowntoEarthAstronomy No i meant for speed curves. it was a stupid question bc this is about shield builds not entire ship builds; im not smart sometimes sorry lol

[@DowntoEarthAstronomy]

Ah ok. No i have not done any speed calculation.

[@soapmode]

Thanks for your hard work.

[@MrAndrei4777]

Great work Dave. What language u wrote it in? Do a technical video on this script please.

[@DowntoEarthAstronomy]

Powershell. technical video will be comming soon

[@CmdrFlemming]

Looking forward to that :-)

[@cmdrglass5096]

I have found Lo-Draw secondary and like it better than Fast Charge . Have a look in EDSY and coriolis ship builders I have found it as good as Fast Charge or better

[@choppy6324]

Gday CMDR thanks for contributions to the community!! question are you able to make an app for this program

[@AUXiDE1]

Wow broski amazing job you're the best