Need help with my Pike

[Cotlu-Hunlon]

I'm new to GSF, having never been able to play it until I got a new computer since my old laptop would nearly melt in the tutorial alone. Now I'm hooked and I'm focusing on the Pike, it's what I want to use and no one can change my mind I've looked at most of the builds for Pike/Quell and there's some variation for the Thrusters and I really can't decide on which Thruster to use myself. I'd also love some advice and pointers if what I'm using below is good starting point before I start to upgrade individual components.

 

I'm using:

 

Ship

Quad Laser (tried Heavy but my aim is too bad right now for them to be effective)

Proton

Concussion (I'm bad at staying in close enough range for the Clusters)

Directional Shield (would charged plating be better? Read a lot of posts about people saying QCS is not good)

Barrel Roll (definitely prefer over the Kturn to be able to chase down)

 

Deflection armour (seen a lot of people say go for Lightweight as evasion is better, should I? I keep getting killed by mines as it is, don't want to make that worse)

Damage Capacitor

Munitions Extender (I'm not really on long enough killstreaks for this to help, should I change?)

 

And then Thrusters I'm using Speed because that's the first one given but it's the one I'm most unsure about.

 

Crew

Qyzen

Tanno Vik the 10% shield power pool (is this good or should I use Dmg reduction instead?)

Akaavi (co pilot for Wingman)

C2-N2

 

Thanks in advance, sorry that there are so many questions

Edited January 1, 2015 by Cotlu-Hunlon

[tunewalker]

I'm new to GSF, having never been able to play it until I got a new computer since my old laptop would nearly melt in the tutorial alone. Now I'm hooked and I'm focusing on the Pike, it's what I want to use and no one can change my mind I've looked at most of the builds for Pike/Quell and there's some variation for the Thrusters and I really can't decide on which Thruster to use myself. I'd also love some advice and pointers if what I'm using below is good starting point before I start to upgrade individual components.

 

I'm using:

 

Ship

Quad Laser (tried Heavy but my aim is too bad right now for them to be effective)

Proton

Concussion (I'm bad at staying in close enough range for the Clusters)

Directional Shield (would charged plating be better? Read a lot of posts about people saying QCS is not good)

Barrel Roll (definitely prefer over the Kturn to be able to chase down)

 

Deflection armour (seen a lot of people say go for Lightweight as evasion is better, should I? I keep getting killed by mines as it is, don't want to make that worse)

Damage Capacitor

Munitions Extender (I'm not really on long enough killstreaks for this to help, should I change?)

 

And then Thrusters I'm using Speed because that's the first one given but it's the one I'm most unsure about.

 

Crew

Qyzen

Tanno Vik the 10% shield power pool (is this good or should I use Dmg reduction instead?)

Akaavi (co pilot for Wingman)

C2-N2

 

Thanks in advance, sorry that there are so many questions

 

If you are going to use directionals Stack Evasion with Light weight armor and 10%+ shields and +5% evasion. Also on a pike I prefer Running interference for a Co-pilot ability personally since I find it the only way to really get a good "defensive" stat against Gunships.

 

If you are going to use your Pike against Bombers alot, which means you are going to deal with mines, use Charged Plating and stack Damage Reduction. (on defensive pilot take 9% DR and 10% shield). Swap to Heavies with armor piercing if going for bombers beware of scouts and Gunships. (in such a case you may be good with Hydro spanner for a Co-pilot ability as well)

 

Thrusters are fine, how ever others will prefer turning (allow you to easier keep missile locks and the like) or Regen (helps with boost efficiency and with regening during short boosts) over Speed, speed is usually rarely chosen, but still not a terrible choice.

 

I would avoid QCS on a Pike personally simply because of how little strength it has. it helps offensively, but ultimately I dont think its the right defensive path with a starting Pike player.

 

I would also recommend trying Clusters and Protons again, dont be afraid to swap to protons if the enemy gets to far away or even swap targets. If you are going basically SOLEY for bombers, then your missile load out is fine, you may even try Conc's and EMP or EMP and Proton, to help your team clear mines and shut down the bombers shield ability, but personally I would jsut stick with your missile load out.

 

 

Ultimately its a question more of what you want your pike to do.

Edited January 1, 2015 by tunewalker

[Drakkolich]

First off welcome to GSF!

 

Lets get into the build stuff we'll start with weapons. My favorite style is Heavy lasers, concussion missiles and protons. This gives you armor and shield penetration lasers and both missiles have this ability as well making you able to kill many players without even breaking all there shields. Now if you really would rather use Quad lasers I'd suggest going with clusters somewhere as they synergize really well with each other. Examples would include Quad lasers, cluster missile, concussion missiles, this build is a very high damage build you will be getting much higher numbers on the scoreboard with this. Just make sure you take the armor pen talent on concussions or you won't be able to kill high armored targets.

 

Directional shields are great, but can be difficult for newer players to get used too. If you think you're up to the task stick with those they are by far my favorite on the ship. Charged plating is for very specific tasks, if you're going to be flying pretty much only this ship I'd stick with one of the shield based options instead of damage reduction one.

 

I would recommend changing your armor minor component, deflection armor is more for pairing with charged plating. Lightweight will make you better vs railguns and lasers (which is why so many people use it) while reinforced really just gives a little extra health vs everything. I play with lightweight as I just avoid the mines and pick them off with your longer range lasers.

 

For a newer player I would definitely stay away from munitions extender for now, go with regeneration which honestly is so good with quad lasers anyways. Once you get the hang of GSF and start actually running out of ammo consistently you can go back to this one and experiment and see what you like better.

 

With thrusters theres usually only 2 choices regeneration thruster vs turning thruster. I always pick regeneration, I just prefer more engine power over turning faster. If you find yourself always having plenty of engine power then go ahead and swap to turning.

 

You're crew looks perfect. However if you do decide to stick with deflection armor I would swap to the damage reduction defensive crew member like you mentioned.

 

In this game defenses stack additively so you generally just stack all of one.

 

 

I wouldn't get too hung up on your weapon choices, there are multiple good ones for the Pike. The important thing is to try to make there ranges line up and always have 1 weapon that can pierce armor.

 

I hoped this helped I'll try to make a PIke video for ya to show you how I fly it. If you do decide on a specific build in the near future post it and I can make the video with that build.

 

Hope this helps.

[Altheran]

If you have issues with Cluster range, I suggest you to use Heavy lasers instead of Quad. Quad have the same range as cluster missiles.

Also, since you focus on missiles with a rather lengthy range, you'll end firing from your maximal range more often than not... Where Quad accuracy becomes approximately as bad as Heavy accuracy.

 

I may also suggest you to consider Range capacitor. They tend to make things... more comfortable, if I had to put it simply.

 

Munition Extender is a no. Accounting for both missiles ammunition, you start with enough missiles for any random match. Even when doing a perfect match, it will be rare to run out of them, and when it happens, the match is generally close to end.

Go for regeneration magazine.

 

Other than that, some choice may not be my personal choices, but I guess they might be okay

[RickDagles]

I want to emphasize that even in a Pike, secondary weapon is called secondary for a reason. You should still be getting a lot of your damage from blasters. Heavy Laser Cannons are the best lasers in the game for fighting at a range (which you should be doing in a Strikefighter most of the time). They are easily better than Quads, especially when fully upgraded to get armor piercing and shield piercing. It might be hard to use them at first but just practice on shooting them on centered targets while using Wingman co-pilot. Also don't just hold the fire button down, place your shots with patience. And use range capacitors at first. You may want to switch to frequency capacitors as you get better. And yes use regen blasters. Missile choice comes down to personal preference. Clusters are best vs scouts. Protons are good at finishing off low hull targets, especially bombers that can't evade them. Concs are somewhere in between.

 

The Quad/Cluster combo can be very fun and effective but you might as well use a Flashfire if you want to do that IMO.

Edited January 1, 2015 by RickDagles

[Cotlu-Hunlon]

Okay there is a lot of good information here, so thankyou for such detailed responses and Drakkolich for the welcome I'm also glad that none of you really suggested the same thing which means you can get by in many different loadouts rather than there being one best loadout per ship.

 

I was playing tonight and started to realise I had a lot of trouble finishing people off since I would Proton then rush with the Quads only to find I still had a huge amount of shield to eat through. So I will defintely give Heavies another go. I will always keep Proton and switch out the second missile slot; ion missile is looking more attractive now to rip off someone's shield, how effective can it be?

 

Looks like Regen Thrusters are for me too, I've been finding myself a sitting duck having burned through all my engine energy and barrel roll and becoming stranded and easy pickings.

 

Thanks again I will keep referencing this and trying out new things as I learn

[tunewalker]

Okay there is a lot of good information here, so thankyou for such detailed responses and Drakkolich for the welcome I'm also glad that none of you really suggested the same thing which means you can get by in many different loadouts rather than there being one best loadout per ship.

 

I was playing tonight and started to realise I had a lot of trouble finishing people off since I would Proton then rush with the Quads only to find I still had a huge amount of shield to eat through. So I will defintely give Heavies another go. I will always keep Proton and switch out the second missile slot; ion missile is looking more attractive now to rip off someone's shield, how effective can it be?

 

Looks like Regen Thrusters are for me too, I've been finding myself a sitting duck having burned through all my engine energy and barrel roll and becoming stranded and easy pickings.

 

Thanks again I will keep referencing this and trying out new things as I learn

 

I highly recommend staying AWAY from Ion (there is a reason NO ONE suggested it ), if you are going to do that just hit them with a conc, it will deal nearly as much shield damage AS WELL as if you strip some of those shields with quads before you fire then the ship dies out right. Same lock time and half the time for reload. If you are thinking about changing any missile for better kills/ better dps and shield stripping, it should be thinking about concs changed to clusters, they land more reliably and have the highest "damage per second" of any of them.

Edited January 1, 2015 by tunewalker

[SWCNT]

Quads have higher power draw than heavies, so if your issue is accuracy, quads will hurt you more. I'd also recommend quick charge shields over directionals at this point. Let's you focus more on flying.

I agree with what's been said, so I won't rehash, but I will say, WELCOME TO GSF!

Edited January 1, 2015 by SWCNT
typo

[Wythermyre]

I can add nothing to Strikefighter loadouts but I can say Welcome to GSF! We are a great community!

[Ramalina]

If you want a dogfighting build for beginners:

 

Quads

Concussions

Clusters

Engine (K turn recommended for more frequent break, but barrel roll is ok if you plan on running if targeted)

Directional

Lightweight

Regeneration

Range

Regeneration.

 

If you're a glutton for punishment, but want to focus on harassing bombers:

heavies

Protons

concussions

Barrel

Directional if spending some time dogfighting, QCS if playing an almost pure hit-and-run style. Once you get the basics of directionals it takes a barge load of piloting skill before QCS become competitive again in a sustained fight. As a beginner, I'd recommend staying away from damage reduction builds, you should be staying well outside of the range of mines.

Lightweight

Regeneration

Range

Regeneration

 

The builds above aren't strictly speaking the highest performance builds, but to the extent that the Pike is able to have builds that are forgiving of pilot error, these are what it can offer (which is not much).

 

I'd also recommend spending some time in a Novadive. Using rocket pods is fairly good practice for the skills of holding over a target that you need to be able to land proton torpedo shots. It's also a bit easier as there's no warning tone, and you don't have to hold for 3-4 seconds to fire a single shot.

 

Hm, I'm going to add a bit on cross-training recommendations. Get a ship of each non-strike class (a scout, a gunship, and a bomber), build it in a fairly standard build from Stasie's guide and play enough to get at least 30-35 thousand requisition on it, and then play at least 10 games at that upgrade level. It'll give you a much better appreciation of the fundamentals of each class, which is something that you're going to need if you plan on having the Pike as your primary ship.

 

Once you've done your intitial cross-training, try to do at least 1-2 matches per week in a non-strike ship, at least until you've got roughly 300-400 matches total. As you get better as an overall pilot, you'll discover new things about other ships when you're training in them, so no matter how much you love the Pike you shouldn't completely stop flying other ship types. Some of your most useful flying when learning how to best use a Pike is going to come in the cockpits of other ships.

 

In particular, when flying the other ships pay attention to, "what makes this class work against other classes," and also think about, "how would I play this class against my Pike." That's what'll get you the most value out of spending time in other ships to improve your Pike flying skills.

[Cotlu-Hunlon]

Hm, I'm going to add a bit on cross-training recommendations. Get a ship of each non-strike class (a scout, a gunship, and a bomber), build it in a fairly standard build from Stasie's guide and play enough to get at least 30-35 thousand requisition on it, and then play at least 10 games at that upgrade level. It'll give you a much better appreciation of the fundamentals of each class, which is something that you're going to need if you plan on having the Pike as your primary ship.

 

Yes I'd wondered about this. There are times where I'm fighting againt a bomber and flying behind him at he kills me without turning around to face me and I'm left wondering how I died.