Part 1 – Before “Les Voyages”
Waves of Hanajima
There she is! Thought I’d start with my favourite ship of all. My beautiful Krait Phantom the Waves Of Hanajima, She’s an excellent rat ship of course, but I find she doesn’t handle quite as well in supercruise as my Asp Explorer. So I only tend to use her for ratting if I’m doing something else at the same time. Like collecting materials for example. She’s great at quickly searching the bubble for material sites whilst also keeping an ear out for fuel emergencies. She can carry plenty of limpets too for this purpose.
El’ahrairah’s Request
My main ratting ship. This AspX has been fitted with the double engineered FSD and has had everything possible “lightweighted” to give her the furthest possible jump range, whilst still carting around a modest supply of limpets.
As you can see she has had the Fuel Rat decals applied and, coupled with my Fuel Rat Mischief Squadron identifier, attackers are in no doubt that, by meddling with this ship, they are putting another commander’s life at risk. One day it might be them!
I put a spoiler on her too because, well, AspX’s look great with spoilers! She’s rescued dozens of pilots so far and counting. She’s also had her thrusters fully engineered by Professor Palin and this makes her pretty speedy too!
She is also very good at spotting biological specimens from the sky because of the excellent view from the cockpit. This also makes it easier to perform the highly dangerous TFP manoeuvre when rescuing code red clients from inside the exclusion zones of stars. I’ve been trained in the TFP manoeuvre but I’ve nver had to do it for real. Yet. But I have done plenty of biological research with her when she’s not on standby for the Fuel Rats.
Rabscuttle
The first ship I actually bought after the one I started with was a Cobra Mk III. I mean, of course it was a Cobra. The Cobra was the ship I flew back in the Commander Jameson days so it has a certain nostalgia about it. And what a wonderful ship she is! At first I used her as a general purpose mission runner, my main goal being to get a high enough Federation rank to be allocated a Sol system permit. I named her the Rabscuttle (anyone care to spot the reference?) as these days she is always up to tricks and general no good.
You see, I now use her exclusively for smuggling. Back in the day one could only smuggle narcotics, firearms or slaves. But these days there are many theocratic systems that have outlawed consumer technology. Somehow the citizens in these systems are gaining access to some of this tech (namely video game consoles) and it’s me who is smuggling them in.
Smuggling is a pastime I turn to when I’m getting a bit tired of everything else (which isn’t very often). It’s dangerous. It’s edgy. You need heatsinks because although you can enter silent running to avoid being scanned it heats your ship up drastically! It’s better if it’s done without shields because when you enter silent running on approach to a station your shields turn off anyway. If I’m discovered, I’m toast. Unless a quick boost from the Rabscuttle’s powerful engines can take her out of range. It also means that the best way into the station is manual flight. So not only does she lack shields but also a docking computer. I’m docking manually with spinning stations in a Cobra Mk III.
Just like old times!
Palomino
The Palomino is the very same ship I began the game with. I hadn’t named her back then, of course (I didn’t know you could) I was to busy trying to figure out why on Earth the stupid ship wouldn’t land on the stupid landing pad in the stupid station. Then I realised I had taken so long trying to figure out how to use the lateral thrusters the docking permission window had timed out and all I had to do was ask permission again. Hey Presto! I landed.
Now the astute among you, just by the name of the ship and her ID will have worked out what I use her for these days. She is permanently docked at Bao City in the Vorduli system, which is nestled in the Hyades star cluster. It’s the closest shipyard to HIP 34707, and it’s the secondary star HIP 34707b that I’m interested in. You see, HIP 34707b is a black hole.
I love the way black holes are presented in this game! You can forget your accretion discs and jet ejections – I like them just like this thanks! They creep me out something rotten. The way they distort the light around them even though you can’t see them directly makes me shudder. And I love that.
The best way to approach a black hole is to try and get some sort of stellar phenomena behind it, such as a nebula or the Milky Way (like I have done here) and watch the lensing effect as you gradually approach. And I mean gradually, if you approach too fast you risk getting torn out of FrameShift resulting in damage to your hull.
Once you reach the black hole (and you will be surprised at how close you can get and exactly how tiny they are) the lensing effect is both spectacular and horribly spooky in equal measure. Light doesn’t travel this close to a black hole in the same way it travels everywhere else and it makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. It’s an experience I can recommend to everyone.
Be careful not to stay too long though or you’ll go boom. And be extra careful to make sure to pop a heatsink before you FrameShift away, or you’ll overheat!
Delanderby
My Cutter, the Delanderby, is primarily used for mining and hauling. A bit of a shield tank with fully engineered shields and boosters and a fully engineered hull with fully engineered hull reinforcement. She’ll last a very long time indeed against any NPC interdictions. Not that anyone will get many shots in. Fully engineered engines makes her pretty fast too and she’s off and recharged her FSD before you know it. The only ship that can mass-lock a Cutter is another Cutter!
She can hold a lot of cargo too. My load-out usually allows for 720t hauling or 512t mining, with plenty of grade 5 collection limpet controllers. I used her a lot for the Federation rank grind at Canopus stacking those cargo missions and none of the incoming enemies could touch me!
She is such a beautiful vessel, you would have to try really hard to take a bad screenshot of a Cutter. She also makes the most wonderful noises! And that is why I named her the Delanderby! Extra brownie points to anyone who can work out what the name means!
Hrairoo
Hrairoo is a Diamond Back Explorer. She was the third ship I purchased after having fun messing around in the Rabscuttle. I wanted something with a bigger jump range to make those passenger sightseeing missions a little easier. She earned me enough money ferrying passengers on their “trip of a lifetime” to eventually buy the El’ahrairah’s Request. By undertaking these missions, I got to go to all sorts of interesting places in the Bubble and learn all sorts of lore. It’s a highly recommended occupation for nearly new commanders! It wasn’t long before I was researching the nearest black holes and neutron stars to the bubble and flying out to them.
Once I had purchased the Asp Explorer, Hrairoo languished in storage for quite some time. I didn’t think of using her until I was researching my first Guardian site visit. I was wondering what ship to use and decided my old DBX would be the best one to use!
You’ll need to land pretty close to a Guardian Site so that your point defence turrets (always remember to equip when visiting Guardian sites) can take care of the Sentinels’ missiles, and some of the sites have very limited landing space close by. So a small vessel is usually the best.
I visited this particular site to purchase myself some Guardian Fighter blueprints. It was the first time flying Hrairoo since the Odyssey update and I really wanted to get out of the SRV and actually walk around and touch some of the structures. I wasn’t disappointed!
Part 2 – “Pour Les Voyages”
The El-ahrairah’s Request.
My beloved Asp Explorer. I’ve had her for years. Learned how to core mine in this ship. She is very dear to me indeed! But, she needs a rest so it will be a while before I get her out again.
The Red Hare.
My Krait Mk II. Engineered purely for combat I needed her to help win wars for Colonia council and hunt notorious pirates for bounty vouchers. Mel Brandon rather likes those. Not much use out in the Black except she has a fighter bay and I do like to have a fighter handy when exploring. I can always lighten her loadout and refit her as more of an explorer, once I’m done fighting.
The Delanderby.
Mainly for mining, and for transporting Tritium to the Esmerelda Weatherwax when I’m in a position to buy some.
The Hrairoo.
I coudn’t leave her behind. I just couldn’t. I’m not sure I really need a DBX with everything else I’m taking but…no…
I love this ship. Dearly. It’s why I named it so.
The Waves Of Hanajima.
What can I say? She’s a Krait Phantom for Braben’s sake! I took my first major expedition in her. She’s also a ratship and, well, you never know.
The Brenda Zephyr.
How could I leave dear old Brenda Behind? That trip I took half way across the galaxy to meet up with Picard is full of such lovely memories. Huge jump range with an extra fuel tank and all the bells and whistles so I can leave the carrier behind when I want to venture deep into sparse starfields.
The Palamino.
I’ll be visiting a fair few black holes I expect! Plus I might go for quite a few long voyages in her. I’ve fully engineered her now and I’ve managed to squeeze everything I need in there.
I’m really looking forward to spending quality time with her.
The Silver Machine.
My super fast exploration Imperial Courier. Great fun to explore in but can get a little hot while fuel scooping. Probably the most beautiful ship in the fleet; I always get a warm, fuzzy feeling when returning to her after a long soujourn out in the SRV – of which she has two! A Scarab called Brock and a Scorpion called Kilmister.
The Freddled Gruntbuggly.
My Type 9. If I fancy a change when it’s mining time, I can take Grunty. But she’s not really engineered for mining. Out in the black it’s ok but if I mined in her near civilization she’d get blown to bits. Paper thin armour, engineered thrusters and modules as light as can be.
She’s a Canyon Cow Racer!
The Samus Aran.
My Imperial Clipper. I have never explored in a Clipper, and I’ve always wanted to.
Samus is serious fun to fly so I’ll be testing her exploration potential soon!
The Rabscuttle.
Now with added Ruby Anniversary decal! I mean, I flew a Cobra Mk III forty years ago when I was a teenager and just embarking on all this space exploration stuff, so Rabscuttle is tagging along – just in case I have a need to feel nostalgic.
The Thayli’s Gambit.
Always wanted to explore in one of these. I love flying Chieftains and am eager to see how they fare as explorers. EDIT: Not too good. Dreadful supercruise performance and a restrictive amount of slots make exploring a slog.
The Starlifter.
Named after that wonderful second album by Canadian prog duo “Crown Lands”. The first SCO specialist ship of the fleet. Beautiful, manoeuvrable, fast, cool, lands anywhere.
For planetside screenshots however, she kinda resembles an arrogant frog.
The Aching Tiffany.
I know the Starlifter would be the first choice for most people, but I prefer exploring in small ships and so the new Cobra Mk V is an essential. The first and only (so far) small SCO specialist ship. And she looks so good sitting in the distance in planetside screenshots!
Thunderbird 2
Purchased as soon as it was available for ARX and promptly landed it at Beagle Point ‘cos – why not? Not sure what I’ll be using the Delanderby for now I can quickly fill up on tritium with this baby! Now all I need is a Thunderbird 4 to explore water worlds.
The Lovely Jubbly
I dunno what it is about this ship. I’ve used all of the above ships and the Starlifter and the Aching Tiffany in particular. Yet I always come back to this one.
She has her challenges, for sure. Even with an SCO drive and an extra fuel tank I still have to keep a stressful eye on the gauge as I travel to distant orbiting stars. She heats up pretty quickly, too – always having to find that sweet spot between taking far too long to scoop fuel and cooking my internal modules. Limited slots mean sacrificing an SRV or an AFMU. Can’t have both.
Yet there’s something about the way she flies, the way she sounds, the way she looks. The way she can make a screenshot pop far more than I can achieve with any other vessel.. There’s something intrepid, daring and compelling about exploring in a hauler which, for me, outclasses all the other ships in which I’ve braved the farthest depths of the Black.
Whenever the lustre of exploration begins to dull, I can always rely on the Lovely Jubbly to re-engage its allure.
Elite Dangerous RUSH FLEET 