You Always Remember Your First.......Thargoid Battle
30 Nov 2018Scubadog
I was silly enough to join a couple of my fellow Sillverbacks out into a system to poke the bears...or, rather, Thargoids. Out of complete ignorance I thought swapping out my engineered weapons my Vulture normally has for some Guardian weapons would be the right call. Turns out, not so much. At least not for the types we were hunting. Those Thargoid Scouts are nimble little buggers, and trying to line up a Guardian gauss or other weapon, even with my engineered Vulture, requires a skill I just don't have. And that damned caustic snot they have burns away at your hull. I got exactly one kill.So, take two. I limped back to Janes Horizons in Arexe and swapped the Guardian weapons out for a couple of trusty AX multi-cannons. I dropped my Advanced System Scanner and picked up a Guardian hull reinforcement--it wouldn't stop the caustic snot from damaging me but it would counteract glancing blows and slow down direct hits. I stored my SRV and loaded up a limpet controller for scraping that crap off my hull and shrunk my cargo module down to a size 4 (I shouldn't need more than that number of limpets in a hurry, and I can synthesize more as needed).
I high-tailed it back out to meet up with my wingmates, cautiously optimistic that my Vulture was better prepared. And I was right. While the Vulture is limited to two hardpoints, those hardpoint are LARGE. The AX cannons definitely made short work of most of the scouts! As expected, the Guardian hull reinforcement did better than I dared hope at reducing caustic damage. What it couldn't handle my limpets quickly cleaned up. Plus I had capacity to help out any of my wingmates if they weren't carrying.
Between us, we turned in a couple million credits or more of combat bonds. By the next day I couldn't find anymore Thargoid in the system...a pretty good effort, I'd say! Now, lest I get cocky, it bears pointing out that a day later, in another system, I winged up with another commander to take shots at some of the larger Thargoid ships. The AX weapons don't do so well there. The bigger ships are slower, but much tougher. I found myself wishing I had those gauss weapons back onboard.
I'm learning.