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NEW PIRATE INITIATIVE: PVE BUILDS

09 Jul 2021IXXX

NEW PIRATE INITIATIVE

PVE GUIDE	PVE BUILDS	PVP GUIDE	PVP BUILDS	PVP TACTICS	FOOT	POLITICS	DISCORD	FREE CONDAS

PVE SHIP BUILDS

PVE ship builds are used for tasks like farming materials by jumping around quickly with an SRV and collectors, blowing up bounty hunted pirates, or anti-xeno Thargoid hunting.

UPDATE: JULY 18: Added Passenger and Rescue archetypes.

TLDR: What are the "must have" PVE ship builds?

You can complete the PVE quickstart path towards PVP with a minimal set of ship builds:

A DBX or Krait Phantom Jump Ship for travel, engineer unlocking, engineering material farming.
a Type 9 Trade or Cutter Trader for trade missions, elite trade rank, and PowerPlay merit module shopping.
A Type 9 (or Cutter or Anaconda) Miner loadout swap for engineering unlocks.
a Dakkaconda for bounty hunting massacre mission stacking.
a Dakkalance (which is also a good first PVP build)
a Type 10 AFK if you want additional bounty hunting massacre mission stacking credits/mats income.

PVE SHIP ARCHETYPES

There are several main archetypes of PVE ship builds.

PVE ARCHETYPE	DESCRIPTION	BEST SHIPS
JUMP	Maximum jump distance for ship size with an SRV bay to harvest engineering materials, a tiny cargo hold to transport engineering unlock materials, and a discovery scanner to find sites on planets.	Diamondback Explorer, Krait Phantom, Anaconda
TRADE	Trade ships deliver cargo for max profit between stations with missions that enhance the profitability.	Cobra, Type 7, Type 9, Cutter
MINING	Mining ships inhale asteroids by lasering or blowing them up.	Type 9, Anaconda, Cutter
BOUNTY HUNTING	Bounty hunting ships are designed for maximum damage output to kill pirates fast and maximum tankiness to do it nonstop.	Vulture, FerDeLance, Python, Anaconda, Corvette, Cutter
ANTI-XENO	Anti-xeno ships use radically different tactics from pirate hunters. The most popular builds are cold-running, staying thermally invisible to Xenos instead of relying on shields.	Chieftain, Krait MkII
EXPLORATION	Like a jump ship but suited for deep space exploration with 1-2 AFMU repair units to keep FSD working after repeated Neutron assisted jumps damage it. Learn to use the Full Spectrum Scanner to get data about solar system objects worth scanning closer.	Diamondback Explorer, Krait Phantom, Anaconda, Asp Explorer
PASSENGER	Passenger ships use passenger cabins to make money, rank and materials ferrying people around on famous routes like the Robigo Run. Not part of this guide, but a very fun challenge keeping difficult customers happy.	Python, Orca, Beluga, Dolphin
RESCUE	Rescue ships carry repair limpets and fuel transfer limpets to fix people up who are broken down or out of fuel. You could even join the Fuel Rats to be part of the organized fuel rescue team.	Python, Anaconda, Corvette, Cutter

PVE SHIP BUILD LIST

Each build is listed with a Coriolis link so you can easily load those into an EDDB search to find where to buy it and EDEngineer to find the materials to engineer it.

SHIP	BUILDS	SIZE	ROLE	DESCRIPTION	-15%	Buy	Fitted
Diamondback Explorer	DBX Un-engineered, DBX Engineered Max Jump	Small	Disposable Jump Taxi	First and best small jump/exploration ship for disposable trips with instant rebuy trips home. Start with un-engineered build. Get the Guardian FSD Booster by farming guardian module blueprints (see below). Buy the Class 5 V1 FSD from human tech broker or engineer a V5 from Felicity Farseer till you do full engineering..	Ix	1.8M	6.8M 5AFSD / 11M Full
Krait Phantom	Jump Phantom	Medium	Jump Multi-Use	Your first Krait Phantom is a jump ship for multiple uses. It is a do-everything while jumping as far as possible ship that you can use for light combat, on-foot mission support, deep space exploration, you name it.		37M
Type 9 Heavy	Type 9 Trader	Large	Trader	The Type 9 or Cutter (if you have the rank) cargo ship is a must-have for trading missions to make money and reach Elite trade rank (unlocking Shinrarta Dezhra's superstore discount). It is also a must for powerplay deliveries of 750 tons once a month. So either you build a Type 9 as soon as you can afford to or you rank grind to get a Cutter instead.	Oppenheimer Dock, LHS 2123	76M	106M
Imperial Cutter	Cutter Cargo Shieldless Drag	Large	Trader	If you have the rank, the Cutter is a straight upgrade over the Type 9 in every way. The Cutter's military compartments let you substitute two hull reinforcements for a shield to max cargo space. For hardpoints, two large frag cannon turrets with drag munitions should slow down anyone trying to catch you, giving you time to FSD out and complete your cargo mission safely. If you feel too vulnerable, put a 6A shield in, but you should not need it most of the time. Large cargo ships are a must-have for trading missions to make money and reach Elite trade rank (unlocking Shinrarta Dezhra's superstore discount). It is also a must for powerplay deliveries of 750 tons once a month.	Denton Patreus-controlled systems -10%	199M	282M
Krait MkII	PVE Multicannon Krait MkII	Medium	Bounty Hunting	A Krait MkII built like a gimbled PVP Krait with a fighter bay can do a decent job of PVE bounty hunting until you build a large bounty ship like an Anaconda. The main reason to use a medium PVE ship is to get practice to partially prepare you to learn PVP with it.
Fer-De-Lance	Dakkalance	Medium	Bounty Hunting	An FDL built like a gimbled PVP FDL can do a decent job of PVE bounty hunting until you build a large bounty ship like an Anaconda. The main reason to use a medium PVE bounty ship is to get practice to partially prepare you to learn PVP with it.		55M
Anaconda	Dakkaconda	Large	PVE Bounty Hunter/PVP Hull Tank	Building a Dakkaconda is a good way to start with large ship engineering from Todd The Blaster using multi-cannons and rail guns.		146M
Type 10	Type 10 AFK	Large	AFK credits/mats/rank generator	Build this to farm big stacks of wing massacre missions around targets like Qi Yomisii Council Faction Pirates or Alberdhas Pirates and share them with your friends to spread the wealth.		124M
Corvette	Pelley Multivette	Large	PVE Bounty Hunter/PVP Shield Tank	Pelley's Multivette build is a beast at PVE and PVP alike with massive sustained fire from huge multicannons plus all the other PVP staples of frag, rails and nasty special effect drag/dispersal/corrosive turrets. REQUIRES REAR ADMIRAL FED RANK.		187M
Alliance Chieftain	Anti-Xeno Shieldless Chieftain	Medium	Cold-orbiting Thargoid slayer	This build is great for doing your part in the fight against the Xenos and you can make tens of millions per Interceptor kill while you're at it.		19M
Anaconda	Laser Mining Anaconda	Large	Mining	Building a Laser Mining Anaconda is as an efficient way to laser mine quickly with maximum collector limpets at once. Replace controllers with cargo racks as desired if you want to do 256T+ long mining sessions uninterrupted rather than 128T quick ones.		146M	255M

Jump Ships

Jump ships are the first archetype of ship you should invest in building and upgrading to make the rest of the game's long travels go quicker.

Building A Diamondback Explorer

Buying a Diamondback Explorer is a first step to making the rest of your travel, upgrading and farming go faster.
The best small jump ship every pilot should build first is the Diamondback Explorer with a DBX Disposable Jump Ship build. It outjumps the Asp Explorer (ASPX isn't even in the same Small class as ASPX is medium and outclassed by the Medium Phantom Jump Ship in every way except price).

It is a forever best-in-role ship for jobs like long range engineering material farming and engineering unlock tasks.
It gets outclassed eventually by the Krait Phantom for combat and deep space exploration module capacity.
It is easy to build at the start.
It stays disposably cheap enough to go to materials and self-destruct back instantly unless you need to bring cargo or exploration cartographic data back.
This saves the whole return trip, making it effectively twice as fast at one-way journeys.

DBX COST

SHIP COST: 1.8 MC
A GRADE FRAME SHIFT COST: +5 MC
TOTAL WITH ALL A/D COST: 13 MC
REBUY COST: 500 KC

HOW TO BUY A DBX

To buy a DBX with all needed A and D rated modules, go to the Ix system's Scully-Power Station.
BOOKMARK THE DBX JUMP SHIP CORIOLIS BUILD GUIDE: https://s.orbis.zone/f7b_
Use the Coriolis guide as a checklist to figure out what to buy and where to buy it.
In the top right corner is a dollar sign-shaped button labeled "STATIONS THAT SELL THIS BUILD". Click it.
It takes you to an EDDB search result showing which stations sell what you want.
If you don't find any results, remove some modules that are less important till you get a match.

DBX BUILD INGREDIENTS
Here's what you need to build a DBX jump ship (all covered by the Coriolis build list):

SHIP: Buy a Diamondback Explorer at a Li Yong Rui power system like IX for 15% discount on core modules. EDDB or Inara search whatever you can't find there.
INTERNALS: A rate Frame Shift Drive for jump range and D rate everything else for light weight jump distance. (A rate thrusters if you want to zoom around faster at cost of some jump). You can downsize fuel tank size to fuel scoop every jump a bit further using KGBFOAM filtering.
HARDPOINTS: None.
UTILITIES: 1 point defense on top for Guardian sites. (Store when unused to max jump otherwise)
OPTIONALS:
4A fuel scoop
2G SRV vehicle hangar or 4G for 2 for insurance if you tend to lose them.
Planetary surface scanner
Advanced docking computer and super cruise assist help with rapid station hopping
3D shield generator for bump protection

ENGINEERING: Once you can engineer, here's where to start:

FSD: Long range with mass manager since it is class 5 and up. Replace with a human tech broker's V1 double-engineered FSD as soon as you have 26 Tellurium and 18 Datamined Wake Exceptions (See below for how).
DISTRIBUTOR: You can downsize distributor to 1 or 2 engine focused grade 5 and still boost, but start with a full size 4D.

BOOSTING YOUR DBX JUMP RANGE FURTHER

Now you need to add 2 things to make it jump extra far: FSD Booster and FSD V1.

Go for the Optional FSD booster first.

FOLLOW THIS GUIDE TO GET GUARDIAN STUFF:
How to unlock Guardian module in Elite Dangerous:
https://cmdrs-toolbox.com/guides/guardian-modules

Guardian modules are hybrid modules created from a combination of human and guardian technology.

They can be unlocked at a guardian tech broker such as Ohm City in LHS 20.
After you unlock FSD Boosters, they will be available to buy just as any other module.
The Guardian FSD Booster is an important first module to get to increase your jump range by up to 10 LY for every ship you put it on.
You fly to Synuefe NL-N C23-4 with the DBX and an SRV and gather materials there.
Once you have those, you can self-destruct or fly back to the bubble to get the cartographic data at the end.
You may need to farm focus crystals from a place like Dav's Hope (Google it) and/or material trading if you don't have any yet.
HN Shock mounts can be bought from a station (Search Inara for exporters).
Once you have all the stuff, you go to a guardian tech broker such at LHS-20 Ohm City and unlock Guardian FSD Boosters.
Now you can buy Guardian FSD Boosters from Outfitting as optional modules up to Class 5 and put them on all your ships for up to +10LY jump distances.

GUARDIAN FSD BOOSTER MATERIAL REQUIREMENTS:

1 Guardian Module Blueprint Fragment, Guardian Blueprint Fragment (shoot pillars, put relic in slot, target orb, scan)
21 Guardian Power Cell, Guardian Material
21 Guardian Technology Component, Guardian Material (Use the double pillar repeatedly, see guide)
24 Focus Crystals, Manufactured Material (you can find using Dav's Hope or high grade emissions and trading)
8 HN Shock Mount, Commodity (Search Inara for stations that export HN Shock Mounts)

Engineered FSD V1
A unique Class 5 Frame Shift Drive with Increased Range and Faster Boot Sequence called "Engineered FSD V1" can be purchased at Human Technology Brokers.

Unlike unlocking other Technology Broker items, which makes them permanently available for purchase with credits at station outfitting services, unlocking the Engineered FSD V1 immediately places one module in local storage at no extra cost.
The module must also be unlocked repeatedly in order to obtain multiple copies.
Applying any other engineering modifications to this module will remove the bonus second modification, but an Experimental Effect like Mass Manager can be safely added or replaced.

Buying each FSD V1 requires the following Materials:

18 Datamined Wake Exceptions
26 Tellurium
26 Electrochemical Arrays
28 Chemical Processors

Krait Phantom Medium Jump Ship

The Krait Phantom is the king of medium jump ships. It makes for a tankier, longer-range combat-capable version of the DBX but it is expensive enough to be not so disposable for skipping return trips.

Trade Ship Builds

Trade ships require massive cargo space and minimal shields to fend off pirates that interdict you.

Type 7 Cargo Ship

The Type 7 is just a stepping stone to upgrade to the Type 9 once you make enough money.

Type 9 Cargo Ship

The Type 9 is the maximum cargo capacity trade ship till you unlock the Cutter.

Imperial Cutter Cargo Ship

The Cutter is the tankiest and highest-capacity cargo ship that is worth doing the Imperial Rep Grind (See PVE Quickstart/Courier/Rep Grind section). It has military compartments that can be filled with hull or cell banks to make it strong and it is fast boosting to get out of trouble and near impossible to mass lock.

PVE Bounty Hunting Ship Builds

Bounty hunting builds need a lot of firepower to kill pirates as quickly as possible and enough tankiness to survive doing it for extended periods.

The Anaconda Dakkaconda PVE Bountyhunter

The Anaconda is the first large combat ship you can purchase and it makes a great PVE bounty and conflict farming machine in addition to the other multi-use roles it can perform.

The easiest build to start with is the Dakkaconda using multicannons with incendiary, autoloader and corrosive experimentals to shred shields and hull alike plus some long range feedback cascade rails to cancel SCBs. This is good to start since it uses less power and distributor at a time before you unlock and max laser engineers.

Type 10 AFK Turret Massacre Ship

The Type 10 AFK turret massacre ship is a money maker to help you keep your finances growing while you focus on other kinds of improvement such as group PVE activities, PVP skill building, exploration, Anti-Xeno fighting, and so on.

Corvette Multivette PVE/PVP Multi-role combat ship

The Corvette is worth unlocking Federal Rear Admiral Rank for. It is a faster-rotating more maneuverable and more powerful upgrade from the Anaconda in most respects.

As for builds, there are optimized PVE builds using lasers to avoid rearming, but a Pelley Multivette as described in the PVP Guide also shreds at PVE and saves you the material gathering trouble of engineering 2 different combat ships. PVE is easy enough with these ships that over-engineering for PVE is overkill and being engineered for PVP makes you ready to get to the really challenging part: Fighting players!

Anti-Xeno Ships

Killing Thargoids to defend humanity ain't easy but it sure is fun!

Chieftain Anti-Xeno Cold Orbiter

Anti-Xeno Chieftain Coriolis Build
The Chieftain Anti-Xeno Cold Orbiter literally runs circles around Thargoids staying below 20% with thermal vent beam so they can barely fight back.

Mining Builds

This PVE Quickstart does not go into detail about mining ships as they're profitable but not absolutely essential to making money and prepping for PVP, but they will be necessary for one of the engineering unlocks and mining can be a lot of fun. As with the Anti-Xeno PVE route, it is a fun career path in its own right that you can find other guides for.

The Laser Mining Anaconda

The Anaconda Laser Mining build is the fastest speed mining build with a huge swarm of collector limpets inhaling asteroids like candy.

NEXT STOP: PVP!

Once you are making a lot of money, materials and rep by material farming and mission stacking, you will have resources to start building your PVP ship fleet and learning the ways of PVP in PVP GUIDE.