Best way to capture capital ships?

[Vaeo]

L ships don't use highways and don't 'boost' on them. Check how big the lanes are and note it isn't supposed to fit a L ship. Your ship was probably killed by turning the highway into a mass driver with sentient projectiles.

Yeah. I just successfully capped a ship, but it got blown up making it to the highway, ODDLY, it was right in the middle of the highway and no matter how i maneuvered it for like 10 minutes in the blue stream it wouldn't boost away! Any idea why?

Brilliant metaphor.

[Vaeo]

But I still want to know what kind of weapons people are using to strip cap ships of their shield and surface implements inside of 12-15 minutes and walk away with a score like that with only 2-3 marines on board their ship.

[argon_emperor]

But I still want to know what kind of weapons people are using to strip cap ships of their shield and surface implements inside of 12-15 minutes and walk away with a score like that with only 2-3 marines on board their ship.

The Ion gun is the only weapon really capable of doing that fast. If you want to go with the method of using only a few marines by making their crew bail until it's just the captain, have a ship that has at least 2 weapons (4 is great), with half being ion weapons and the other half being damage weapons of your choice (cause ion weapons take forever to try and chew through the hull). Can still work with just ion weapons, capped a Heracles with just a Cerberus using only ion cannons, just be prepared for the long haul, if you're *lucky* they'll launch an escape pod every 30 sec - 1 min. Each pod will have 3 crew. And you want to aim to get it down to 1 crew (just the captain, never seen him bail on an L+ ship).

But before you begin, definitely scan the ship, then press the Home key repeatedly to cycle through the surface elements on the ship, take note of what's on there. Tracking Targets are number 1 priority, sometimes they'll still fire at you even in the ship's blind spot. Engines aren't necessary to take out, if you can get the shield down fast enough, they can't boost away, and while you're shooting they can't engage travel drive.

[Vaeo]

But I still want to know what kind of weapons people are using to strip cap ships of their shield and surface implements inside of 12-15 minutes and walk away with a score like that with only 2-3 marines on board their ship.

The Ion gun is the only weapon really capable of doing that fast. If you want to go with the method of using only a few marines by making their crew bail until it's just the captain, have a ship that has at least 2 weapons (4 is great), with half being ion weapons and the other half being damage weapons of your choice (cause ion weapons take forever to try and chew through the hull). Can still work with just ion weapons, capped a Heracles with just a Cerberus using only ion cannons, just be prepared for the long haul, if you're *lucky* they'll launch an escape pod every 30 sec - 1 min. Each pod will have 3 crew. And you want to aim to get it down to 1 crew (just the captain, never seen him bail on an L+ ship).

But before you begin, definitely scan the ship, then press the Home key repeatedly to cycle through the surface elements on the ship, take note of what's on there. Tracking Targets are number 1 priority, sometimes they'll still fire at you even in the ship's blind spot. Engines aren't necessary to take out, if you can get the shield down fast enough, they can't boost away, and while you're shooting they can't engage travel drive.

So I did try something like this with an argon heavy fighter and it ended miserably. What do you suggest for chewing through the hull? Hull is where I lose a lot of my time and progress.

[argon_emperor]

But I still want to know what kind of weapons people are using to strip cap ships of their shield and surface implements inside of 12-15 minutes and walk away with a score like that with only 2-3 marines on board their ship.

The Ion gun is the only weapon really capable of doing that fast. If you want to go with the method of using only a few marines by making their crew bail until it's just the captain, have a ship that has at least 2 weapons (4 is great), with half being ion weapons and the other half being damage weapons of your choice (cause ion weapons take forever to try and chew through the hull). Can still work with just ion weapons, capped a Heracles with just a Cerberus using only ion cannons, just be prepared for the long haul, if you're *lucky* they'll launch an escape pod every 30 sec - 1 min. Each pod will have 3 crew. And you want to aim to get it down to 1 crew (just the captain, never seen him bail on an L+ ship).

But before you begin, definitely scan the ship, then press the Home key repeatedly to cycle through the surface elements on the ship, take note of what's on there. Tracking Targets are number 1 priority, sometimes they'll still fire at you even in the ship's blind spot. Engines aren't necessary to take out, if you can get the shield down fast enough, they can't boost away, and while you're shooting they can't engage travel drive.

So I did try something like this with an argon heavy fighter and it ended miserably. What do you suggest for chewing through the hull? Hull is where I lose a lot of my time and progress.

I would get your rep up to 10 with a faction so you can get access to the military weapons, I personally use the Bolt Cannon, but the Plasma Cannon would work fine as well (usually don't like using it because it's a slower projectile, but if you're going up against a larger ship and you're sitting right up their rear then it's probably pretty hard to miss even with a slow weapon XD )

[Vaeo]

The Ion gun is the only weapon really capable of doing that fast. If you want to go with the method of using only a few marines by making their crew bail until it's just the captain, have a ship that has at least 2 weapons (4 is great), with half being ion weapons and the other half being damage weapons of your choice (cause ion weapons take forever to try and chew through the hull). Can still work with just ion weapons, capped a Heracles with just a Cerberus using only ion cannons, just be prepared for the long haul, if you're *lucky* they'll launch an escape pod every 30 sec - 1 min. Each pod will have 3 crew. And you want to aim to get it down to 1 crew (just the captain, never seen him bail on an L+ ship).

But before you begin, definitely scan the ship, then press the Home key repeatedly to cycle through the surface elements on the ship, take note of what's on there. Tracking Targets are number 1 priority, sometimes they'll still fire at you even in the ship's blind spot. Engines aren't necessary to take out, if you can get the shield down fast enough, they can't boost away, and while you're shooting they can't engage travel drive.

So I did try something like this with an argon heavy fighter and it ended miserably. What do you suggest for chewing through the hull? Hull is where I lose a lot of my time and progress.

I would get your rep up to 10 with a faction so you can get access to the military weapons, I personally use the Bolt Cannon, but the Plasma Cannon would work fine as well (usually don't like using it because it's a slower projectile, but if you're going up against a larger ship and you're sitting right up their rear then it's probably pretty hard to miss even with a slow weapon XD )

Faction 10 rep is no problem. I'm attacking paranid scum because they are holy rollers. My afction rep with argon is 20, so I could actually buy capital ships. I sort of just wanted to fund that by pirating bigguns and then buying my own argons vessels of choice.

[Vaeo]

But since for this strat stripping the hull isn't actually vital, just sitting in the blindspot and pumping the other ship full of bullets, would you go with plasma cannon or bolt rippers for the swiftest hull damage?

[argon_emperor]

So I did try something like this with an argon heavy fighter and it ended miserably. What do you suggest for chewing through the hull? Hull is where I lose a lot of my time and progress.

I would get your rep up to 10 with a faction so you can get access to the military weapons, I personally use the Bolt Cannon, but the Plasma Cannon would work fine as well (usually don't like using it because it's a slower projectile, but if you're going up against a larger ship and you're sitting right up their rear then it's probably pretty hard to miss even with a slow weapon XD )

Faction 10 rep is no problem. I'm attacking paranid scum because they are holy rollers. My afction rep with argon is 20, so I could actually buy capital ships. I sort of just wanted to fund that by pirating bigguns and then buying my own argons vessels of choice.

If you're not adverse to using mods, there's one on the Nexus to improve crew training, could fill up your ship with marines, do other stuff for a bit till they're 5 star in boarding and morale (will take a while though ), and then attack again. In the boarding interface, you can just select "very strong" for both the defences and the hull, so that way your ship will just launch the marines straight away, could even do it with 100% hull, shields and defences (though if you're going against a captial ship with 3-4 marines, even 5 star ones, may not be the best idea, they tend to have 1000 odd boarding defence easy )

And in regards to the question, bolt rippers will do less damage to the hull over time I think, so they're probably better than the plasma cannon

EDIT: link to mod - https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/8

[Vaeo]

Using the blind spot and getting the crew to bail I just captured my first destroyer. : D

And for the record, I still don't know why my crews lost in earlier attempts against vessels that had 40-50 more boarding power then. They ALL made it aboard.

[argon_emperor]

There's always some random chance involved, I had a team that had about 500 more boarding power than the target lose (was about 900 def to my 1400 attack). Sometimes it's just the way the almighty RNG likes to mess with us

[Vaeo]

There's always some random chance involved, I had a team that had about 500 more boarding power than the target lose (was about 900 def to my 1400 attack). Sometimes it's just the way the almighty RNG likes to mess with us

Maybe. But I usually had about 50 more boarding power. And was still losing in like 5-8 shots.

[Phoynix]

Its doable with pulse lasers, they are actually my capping weapon of choice because of their extremely low heat output, outside of Ion they are the best weapons for a little fighter against a Capital ship. How did you lose progress? Don't start shooting the ship if fighters are around, everything will turn hostile in 100km or so of the target when you attack it unless your actually hostile with the group you are attacking outside of that all stay blue and wont come help. If its turrets, you are driving your ship all the way up to the engines so the back of the ship feels the screen and you would impact the hull? You stop at this point cut engines completely and the Enemy capital ship pulls you along with itself while you take out the engines.

Not sure why you are having Trouble... the easiest ship to cap capital wise is a Paranid super transport so maybe start there.

But I still want to know what kind of weapons people are using to strip cap ships of their shield and surface implements inside of 12-15 minutes and walk away with a score like that with only 2-3 marines on board their ship.

The Ion gun is the only weapon really capable of doing that fast. If you want to go with the method of using only a few marines by making their crew bail until it's just the captain, have a ship that has at least 2 weapons (4 is great), with half being ion weapons and the other half being damage weapons of your choice (cause ion weapons take forever to try and chew through the hull). Can still work with just ion weapons, capped a Heracles with just a Cerberus using only ion cannons, just be prepared for the long haul, if you're *lucky* they'll launch an escape pod every 30 sec - 1 min. Each pod will have 3 crew. And you want to aim to get it down to 1 crew (just the captain, never seen him bail on an L+ ship).

But before you begin, definitely scan the ship, then press the Home key repeatedly to cycle through the surface elements on the ship, take note of what's on there. Tracking Targets are number 1 priority, sometimes they'll still fire at you even in the ship's blind spot. Engines aren't necessary to take out, if you can get the shield down fast enough, they can't boost away, and while you're shooting they can't engage travel drive.

So I did try something like this with an argon heavy fighter and it ended miserably. What do you suggest for chewing through the hull? Hull is where I lose a lot of my time and progress.