Star Citizen - What are Heavy Fighters?

[@j.d.4697]

They are like light fighters but heavier.

[@asog88]

I dunno, they are a lot like heavy non fighter ships, but instead are fighters

[@Terran0va_Plays]

Boom

[@Bir-dy]

Heavy, slower, less maneuverable and with more firepower :D

[@Valadian]

Minor correction. The Vanguard Harbinger variant mounts two size 3 guns for the turret.

[@quarkedupphoton236]

Warden has S2 guns turrets guns

[@Valadian]

@@quarkedupphoton236 No, he discusses the 4 variants and states they all have the same weapon loadouts. This is incorrect because on the Harbinger variant the turret has two S3 guns not S2 like the other variants. It's a minor thing but that's why I said it was a minor correction.

[@quarkedupphoton236]

@@Valadian ack

[@bumbleb97]

I'd also add that while the specialized vanguard weapons are size 2, I think they're supposed to be on par with size 3 guns in terms of damage output. I haven't checked Erkul in a while regarding those weapons, but they certainly do more damage when compared to the standard variants.

[@Bir-dy]

There are so many variants of each ship :D

[@quarkedupphoton236]

CIG made changes to the QDs and seems I don't know if the original intent of the heavies is still in play but I guess we'll see in Sqn 42. The Vanguard series, the Warden I've got, has good range with the right QD and has four S2 and one S5 pointed forward in a reasonable grouping. I've had half the ship blown away and it still flys. Seems to work well as a longer range escort ship dealing well with ships up to a HH and within its specialization.

[@Bir-dy]

I think we gonna be waiting for a while. Vanguard is just so nice, I have had the same scenario.

[@SisuTheShattered]

As a Vanguard Harbinger Pilot, spot on. I've been running bunker missions with my buddies, I'd doing gun runs and all of a sudden the AA catches me while my shields were down and I lose a good portion of my ship, but I circle around in a wide arc to let the shields regen, and then continue my runs like I didn't just lose a wing and one engine. Its a great ship, just wish it got some TLC and was brought up a bit more with small QoL changes and fixes.

[@Bir-dy]

@@SisuTheShattered I prefer Hoplite, Almost double the Health and a size 3 turret. With marine seats.

[@SisuTheShattered]

@@Bir-dy I was unaware it had nearly double the health, but I can say the Harbinger has S3 guns for the upper turret The default is rocket pods but I swapped them for the S3 Pyro repeaters

[@Bir-dy]

@@SisuTheShattered In general you cant go wrong with the vanguard. I believe that health is there because it is a small drop ship at the same time.

[@ozramblue117]

Indeed for the time being heavy fighters are generally good for PVE content. There was a time the Warden was beastly.

[@Bir-dy]

It is still pretty strong.

[@ozramblue117]

@ for sure and my old warden, gotten as a concept years ago, isn’t going anywhere.

[@Bir-dy]

@@ozramblue117 Its such a good ship and I love pilot weapon position. is it just me or dose Warden seem the best?

[@ozramblue117]

@@Bir-dy well I’ve kept my Warden so far. I’ve been tempted by the Harb, but I have a real love for the warden. It’s a simple concept and the ship is beautiful in a steampunk sort of way. Long range brawler that is designed to bully other fighters and survive a lot of damage until help arrives. I’ve had many good experiences in mine. I hope when the day comes, they justify those wings and give it some bonus effects in atmo. I’ve limped back from some serious fights in my warden. Not played in a while though. I backed out when master modes went live and now my pc is too old and I haven’t the time or money to justify an upgrade yet.

[@Bir-dy]

@@ozramblue117 I think there is no hurry, since god knows when the game will be ready :D

[@davidoloughlin3180]

Heavy fighters are....always nerfed

[@axm2689]

Yup, they are nerfed because of the desire for ‘balance’. Balance is a very poorly understood and mis-applied concept in this game (by CIG devs at least).

[@Frank-costanza]

​@@axm2689cig uses balance to sell ships. 😄

[@Terran0va_Plays]

“Why do we need civilian variants of military focused ship lines?” Because this isn’t a safe universe. Major threats like Zenothreat, pirate gangs, and even Vanuul on the outskirts of Nyx threaten civilians daily. The UEE can’t be everywhere. That’s why we have the Civilian Defense Force. And they need formidable firepower. Like the Polaris and F8.

[@Monk-Darlington]

As long as light fighters can fly anywhere in the system, they'll be kings of dog fights, once they finally need to be transported to the next planet over and have limited fuel because they are not meant for deep space it should balance itself out, heck, a heavy fighter could/ should be able to simply run the light fighter dry if fuel, well a very good pilot.

[@Bir-dy]

Valid point.

[@nightfoe]

Lmao you're never going to run the Light Fighter dry of fuel unless you're quantuming out and not returning to the fight.

[@Bir-dy]

@@nightfoe I think he means the light fighters might have effective travel range which can limit their combat potential in a future scenario where a player space station might be out in the middle of nowhere far away from most locations where it could be refueled or something like that. But at the moment this seems unlikely.

[@Monk-Darlington]

@@nightfoe well, the hornet f7a mk1 had very limited fuel, these things are designed to work off of carriers or bases to go intercept and kill a threat not to go flying around on patrol for ages, in that sort of situation, id expect a light fighter could run out of fuel and need to return to refuel while less dedicated fighters would have far more fuel and longevity. It makes sense that this is the future really and would be a good balancing factor, light fighters dominate but with minimal range / engagement times vs medium or heavy fighters with more fuel. Mind you, for the light fighter to be run dry woukd require a very good pilot of say a vanguard with likely a average at best pilot in the light fighter, id expect armour to hit light fighters pretty hard too.

[@AdolfoWWolf]

The Vanguard is my favorite ship from the game, ever since it's announcement, beautiful shapes and heavy firepower, looking super sleek as well. Now it just needs a place to fix a box inside, and i'm all set, i like to run bunker missions once in a while, so internal storage would be nice :)

[@arrowfaster2068]

You don't need a cargo grid to store a box, just place it inside and it will be fine.

[@AdolfoWWolf]

@arrowfaster2068 really? I had a bad experience with a cutter, where my delivery box that wasn't attached to the grid was disappearing after a quantum jump, ao I assumed this was happening with ships without cargo grids, maybe it's a cutter bug, but I will test this with the vanguard

[@uss_04]

C2 flies like a Heavy Heavy Heavy Fighter

[@Zach-rw6jf]

I still prefer the Scorpius. Even though it's not that great, and reauires a gunner to be decent at best, it just looks and feels so good. And at the end of the day it puts a smile on my face.

[@DrewTeter]

"What is the point of a civilian variant?" Civilian variants are sold to the Civilian Defense Force (see "Militia Mobilization Initiative") to provide the general populace with a way to hunt down pirates and aid in the fight against aliens, such as the Vanduul swarm. But the UEE Navy still wants to keep some things to itself, so it restricts what can be freely sold.

[@bumbleb97]

I think of the civilian variant kind of like an export variant of a modern piece of military equipment. The export variant of an F35 for example likely won't have all the bells and whistles compared to the variant that the U.S. military uses themselves. You'll want to keep some things to yourselves so as to keep an advantage over everyone else.

[@Bir-dy]

This would fit lore wise. But what I mean is will the only difference between a civilian and military be the weapon size difference. If yes, then it is clear which is going to be ideal. In the end it probably wont matter as it is about the ships sale.

[@BetterThanLifeProd]

The Vaguard is all one ship, with different parts. The center module is, obviously, swappable. but the AR Cockpit is included in the Sentinel Combination Kit, as is the bolt on cockpit armor of the Harbinger Combination Kit. (Combination Kit, formerly known as BUK.)

[@Monk-Darlington]

Yep, now if thryednudt release the a cursed things or give us the full ships as loaner... I've had the warden with the BUK's for soooo long, though I am still somewhat hoping we get to mix and match :)

[@BetterThanLifeProd]

@Monk-Darlington They've always said we get to mix and match.

[@Monk-Darlington]

@@BetterThanLifeProd they have said a lot of things over the years lol, id be surprised if they let us mix and match it as much as I'd like, mixing harbinger with sentinel parts on the warden chassis (emp, size 3 turret).

[@BetterThanLifeProd]

@@Monk-Darlington While I'd like the AR Cockpit on my Warden, it isn't needed. I'll be happy with being able to swap between Warden and Sentinel;. How the hell do I move them from place to place is another issue. LOL.

[@roel2377]

Question is...which is the best heavy fighter

[@Bir-dy]

Depends, as everyone has their favourite and none of them cover all forms of combat perfectly. None of them are good for duels. Ares Ion, Vanguard series and F8C are often favorites of many. Mirai Guardian is also pretty good for the time being. Ares, mirai and vanguard series to fight against heavy targets. The rest have smaller weapons.

[@graveyardshift6691]

The biggest issues of differencing between the fighters is the lack of an armor mechanic. Once the shields go down, there really isn't anything protecting your ship so any class of weapon can shred them. This is why people have a 'Just bring 4 one-man ships instead of a single 4-man ship'. It's also why people consider the light fighter a META. CIG introduced Master Mode as a waste of development time to try and cap the speed of light fighters to force them into engaging slower ships. The problem has never been the boom and zoom. The problem is the lack of armor creating damage reduction and/or straight up damage denial. Bombers and Heavy Fighters don't have a role because there's no real need for them or their heavier ordinance. Any ship can damage any ship. Hopefully when CIG stops fucking around and implements armor ratings that prevent lower class guns from scratching the paint of capital class ships and gives some damage resistance to larger ships, we'll see a reason to bring in Heavy Fighters and Bombers. Meanwhile Light Fighters will be relegated to Interceptor work, as they should be, dealing with only fighter class variants and harassing/screening for bomber waves. Medium fighters will be a balance between the two having enough speed and maneuverability to deal with Light/Interceptors but also carrying enough firepower to scratch bombers and gunships. (Lights and Heavies will do those respective jobs better but the Medium will be the 'Do it all' to a comfortable degree it will be most people's choice.)

[@Bir-dy]

That is a strong take, but didn't they mention during citizencon. That we need to brake the shields of capital ship and then every ship can lay into it. As most of the fighters are not meant to have any effect on those shields.

[@graveyardshift6691]

@@Bir-dy Then why develop torpedo bombers like the Retaliator or the Eclipse? If an Idris, Javelin, BMM, or Kingship can be hammered and destroyed by the like of a Gladus or an Arrow just pew pewing it to death with size 2 weapons, why bring a size 9 torpedo or missile ship? Big heavily armored ships are slow and can't dodge well like fast maneuverable Light craft. But that armor that's slowing them down is supposed to increase survivability. Conversely, Light craft don't have armor slowing them down which means they can more easily outright dodge taking damage instead of soaking it. But there is no armor mechanic to allow bigger ships to soak damage from smaller size weapons. The shield is a neutral defense. The reason they implemented Master Modes, if you actually go back to read why, is to force smaller light craft into a 'tighter combat area' where because of the capped lower speed, they can't maneuver or weave as fast they're supposed to be able to forcing them to engage heavy ships. Meanwhile the heavy ships still don't have the armor plating needed to endure and survive light craft. They can't soak damage while they try to line up a shot. Nothing in this game is meant to shield tank. Shields are to give the pilot a chance to react. From there you ether need to armor tank which you can't because there is no armor mechanic or dodge tank which you can't do because of MM.

[@RythmOfEvolution]

Heavy Fighter atm Gunfood... Weak vs. Small Fighter and useless vs Big Capital.

[@whyno713]

Redeemer has become my favorite extra-heavy fighter with the recent nerf.

[@Bir-dy]

A heavy Fighter + ?

[@Terran0va_Plays]

Well. It’s a gunship so…

[@PRIMEVAL543]

In no world is the Scorpius even close to the F8C… you can deal 50% more damage and have twice as many hp and shoot from different angles when coming with 2 F8C instead of 1 Scorpius with 2 players. And the Ares are the least heavy hitters… They get outgunned by the medium fighter F7A, Ion getting completely outgunned by it…

[@Bir-dy]

Well its not their competitive dps or PvP comparison, but rather weapons focused for larger targets.

[@AyoDuke247]

Is there allot of pve content is star citizen? I might want to try but I don’t like pve

[@Bir-dy]

Yes there is a lot. Plus bugs. There are arena commander PvP games which you can queue up for. Personally I suggest waiting at least for a year, as it seems many things are coming together.

[@AyoDuke247]

@ I meant I don’t like PVP I’m sorry * is there enough pve cause I like pve 😂

[@Pr0phet-n6z]

food for light fighters:)

[@nightfoe]

2:20 This isn't true AT ALL. The Hurricane is currently the strongest performing heavy fighter out of the entire cast when crewed. The Scorpius's larger frame and interceptor tuning prevents it from maneuvering in dogfights to avoid incoming damage, unlike the Hurricane which is slightly smaller than an F7 and its standard fighter maneuverability. It also has the better HP pools for its cockpit and body, allowing it to also take more damage than the more fragile and easier to hit Scorpius, and for tankier targets like the Vanguard, it can just hit at range. The Hurricane also is incredibly solid in group fights, and as long as it stays close to light fighters, it can isolate and eliminate targets even if they try to slot it and stay in its blind spot because the Hurricane's roll is fast enough to always ensure that even the fastest light fighter is ALWAYS in the scope of the turret. And as I said before, its smaller frame will prevent a light fighter from trying to engage it at a distance effectively.

[@Bir-dy]

Im surprised you're the first to defend Hurricane.

[@friggenbozo4495]

Heavy fighters are like all ships on star citizen....unable to access.

[@friggenbozo4495]

OMG I'm trying not to grief quit. It's so bad lol