Gauss Cannons are fun. Mod Shards are INSANE.
22 Feb 2023Ember Lacson
After I finished my business in Mbooni I jumped the Morningstar over to the Ge system (fun fact, the name of this system is the same as the Ancient Greek word for ground, as well as one of the names for Earth, Γῆ (Gê), aka Gaia). It was one of the closest systems to the AXI's current top priority, HIP 26274. I headed to the sole remaining surface port under attack and got interdicted by a handful of...surprisingly hard hitting Scouts. They took my hull down to 65% before their big brother jumped in to finish the job. Fortunately, I only got interdicted once more before getting to the port, and that time I decided not to engage. On the surface, I went straight for the landing pad for a repair and rearm, grabbed a quick kill contract for a Cyclops, and headed back to the surface. I targeted the nearest Scout and let slip the dogs of war. It took several shots to waste each Scout, but a giant grin crossed my face as soon as I saw the first one go. I had so much control over when my shots fired, and with the trailing sights I knew exactly where they would land. They may not have been as precise against the much smaller targets as my normal Gauss cannons, but they absolutely pulled their weight. This was literally the first time I'd had fun fighting Thargoids. I'd felt exhilaration in the past. I'd been proud of rising to meet a new challenge. But this time, it was fun. Thinking about this actually made me pause the writing and throw together a quick frag boat Krait build that I think I want to try sometime.
I kept jetting around, targeting the nearest Scout, and letting 'er rip. I prefer the sound of Shards to Gauss, no contest. With Shards, you can feel the weapon firing. If you turn off your sound generator, you can hear them through the ship's bones. I stopped caring when the Interceptors would show up. I just kept filling the sky with flak, grinning like a gorram psycho. Then I heard Celeste reporting a frame shift anomaly—a normal occurrence—followed by the battle coordinator mentioning Interceptors. I stopped what I was doing, reserved a landing pad for touch and go, and nearly pancaked my poor ship as I scanned the skies for the nearest death flower.
It wasn't until I was all fueled up that I finally got one in my sights. It was at least six klicks away, so I boosted over to help out the local pilots with my new toys. Then I saw the fringes on the hearts and shouted, "OH F**K, that's a Medusa!" (No "fraks" for this encounter.) I dumped pips to engines and boosted away as it was charging its shutdown field. I flipped my neutralizer switch and waited for the wave to wash over before turning around to assess the situation and finding Dusey on my ass like white on rice. I flipped around and boosted again just in time to hear another energy surge alert. I charged the neutralizer again and found its source, a lowly Cyclops. Or maybe it was a Basi; I couldn't tell at that distance and in that light. The best way to find out, without a xeno scanner, at least, is to poke it. That heart exerted itself in just a couple shots. It was in tatters a couple shots later.
Mother of God, these things kick ass. I kept jousting with it. I got caught in its lightning a couple times. I didn't care about technique. This dance of death was brute force, balls to the wall, no holds barred yeet-and-delete. As soon as that thing's shield dropped, I had another volley on it. Another volley after that, and the heart was gone. Rinse, repeat, get money.
Sadly I couldn't stick around after taking down the Cyclops and turning in the mission for the extra cash. But I think the locals had everything on lock. This is the Goids' last push in the system, anyway; the battle for HIP 26274 was won before I got there. I want to do a little more work with this build before I head out to Asterope in a couple days. I'll probably be using my Chieftain Meershaulk and will definitely be using Gauss for my rank attempt, but I want to try Ouranos and his Mod Shards against a Cyclops in a regular encounter. Now, if you'll excuse me, my bed awaits. I have a long day tomorrow.
Postscript: If anybody is interested in the Mod Shard build, it's the standard shieldless AX Krait with the four Gauss switched out. For more info on how to contact the most evil corporation in recent memory to acquire these beauties, check out CMDR Mechan's video here.