Building my first ship: MISC Freelancer - Solo Powerhouse

[FZD]

Be aware also that with some weapons Overclocking seignifically reduce the time a weapon can constantly fire: this maybe not a problem for a dogfighter when you'll have a limited time-on-target, but when dealing with larger and more resialint ships tath could be a withrow instead of an advantage: remember S3 shield and above constantly regenerate.

There are certainly several things that should be considered when overclocking, but to add a few things here:
1) Not every weapon overheats. At least I've never managed to get my ballistic scatterguns to overheat.
2) Some weapons overheat but instantly recover, like ballistic gatling guns.
(Oh, could also depend on size, haven't tested everything)

And then about S3s (AND S2s with the exception of Sukoran) constantly regenerating, well, that could also be the reason you NEED to overclock your guns.
Say you happen upon a Starfarer Gemini that has just one S3, but it's FR-86 overclocked. That's 6772 hp/s regen. It's just 20k hp per shield face, but if you're not doing over 6772 dps, you should just give up.
With most ships, you'll need a very specific loadout and overclocked guns to overcome that, like for Freelancer I think the only option would be overclocked predators. (And since they're ballistics you can get it destroyed even without getting the shields down. Still, those are scatterguns so you'd need to be right in the face of that ship). Putting all your missiles on it might work (as long as counter measures don't eat any), but they'd need to be Thunderbolt IIIs, smaller missiles you'd have more total damage, but since you can only shoot 4 at a time you'd once again need to overcome that regen.

If you got a turret gunner, that makes it easier but still.

HH with two FR-86s overclocked would require like a dedicated bomber or something to take down. (Luckily the NPCs are dumb, so you won't be encountering such monster in missions afaik)

 

[Shadow Reaper]

(Does anyone know of a way to get rid of IR faster? Can I fly through a waterfall or something?)

Wait, this is a misconception...
Cooler doen't prevent or even improve your time-to-overheat: hight colling capacity only provide you some benefitin the recovery time AFTER weapons shut down... and to be fair I'm not even shure about that in the current state of the game.

Actually no. Coolers are not intended to affect weapons shutdown from overheating.

The issue with stealth coolers is they lower the ship's running temp significantly over other coolers, and do so without creating much EM. There are however ways to improve the cooling rate as opposed to the running temperature. The Industrial coolers are for that express purpose.

Thing is, since IR is almost always the larger signature between EM and IR, it is the one that needs to be reduced. Stealth coolers knock that number down. If however, you want to be able to disappear in a flash during combat, you should look at the Industrials. They dump heat more than twice as fast as stealth coolers, and can enable a clever pilot to evade after an engagement, albeit at greater distance.

 

[FZD]

Guys, I found a way of getting rid of IR faster:
Throw away stuff you're not using.

For example, I'm running solo Cuttlas Black. I don't need the turret weapons, maybe if/when those can be slaved to the pilot, but for now, just dead weight, and dead IR.
Getting rid of those two guns was, I believe, around 7 minutes worth of IR. Which is pretty neat because my Cutlass Black was originally around 25min away from an IR value that I'd find toleratable for my purposes (launching missiles at 10km without being detected). So now it's just running around one mission and I'm there.

Yeah, Cuttlas black isn't great for stealth, but it can work. Kinda.
Once I got enough aUEC I might get some more stealth suitable ship, but I just like the weapons&missiles on Cuttlas. (And this stealth thing is just a phase, I'll grow out of it and go back to FR-76 and just announcing my presence)

EDIT: Okey, I grew out of it. While I was typing this, seems my Cuttlasses IR bottomed out at 8839 (w/ stealth components & suppressed. Started at 11539ish suppressed). Not a very good number. And I'm not about to disable weapons or shields just to get bit less.