Can someone explain how to employ stealth, and the limits of its usefulness?

vahadar · Jun 29, 2021

What would you do when you get in your ship to set it up for stealth?
Power off weapons and shield (if your EM is superior to your IR, otherwise keep them turned on on smaller ships, where IR is generally superior to EM), you can use stealth mode, but it can lead to power issues, here i'm never using it. It just caps the power usage of the ship, not making you stealthier. You can manage power use and still stays quiet (using less thrusters, low speed, cooling your IR before, can take up to 30min or so) without it.
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Do you do anything in particular if you hope to travel somewhere undetected, e.g. while mining?
I dont mine ;) But if I'd mine I'd use directionnal scanner (zoomed scanner, conic) not radius scanning pings, it is less seen from distance. Griefers like to search for those big blibs from scanners ;)
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Do you do anything in particular if some other ship appears as a friendly/neutral/hostile and if it initiates combat with you?
In that case you have failed to be stealthy :)
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Do you do anything in particular right before a fight that you initiate (e.g. before approaching a target's location while bounty hunting)?
Sealth is basically useless vs NPC actually.
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How can you best understand your own ship's ability to detect other ships? How can you improve (or what might impair) your own sensors' range and/or sensitivity?
Simple formula : Detection Range in kilometer = Max ( IR , EM ) x 0.25 for S0 radars, 0.50 for S1 radars, 0.75 for S2, 1.00 for S3...
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What can you tell about another ship's ability to detect you? Presumably some ships have better sensors than others?
See the formula above
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Do sensors/radar work equally well in all directions, or are they directional?
Radar works in all direction.
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What else can you do to try to detect another ship before it detects you (e.g. scanning), and is that a good or - as it would seem - a bad idea if you want to remain undetected?
If in space and moving vs someone scanning you WILL be detected most of the time. If i see pings, and I know there are rocks around I generally try to halt in order to be taken for a rock ;) If i see the ping closing in, I run away in decoupled mode, just need a quick burst and then you slide watching the pings from distance.
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Can you target or missile lock another ship without giving your presence/position away, or at least without revealing yourself as hostile to it?
Nope, even if ennemy dont see you he knows that he is targeted. He will just have to ping to find you.
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Is there any reason to NOT target a ship you intend to engage in combat, so that it doesn't realise it has been targeted?
Of course that is the point of stealth fighting, you do not need to target someone to kill him, just know how to shoot fixed guns without a lock and assistance.
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What does that RDR LOCK alarm in the cockpit mean? It lights and sounds LONG before I detect bounty target ships.
If you are in the setup you linked above, you have 11.7k IR and 1954 EM, as long as your components are still turned off, otherwise it is your EM which is by far more superior, making you even less stealthy.
This means you are seen at MINIMUM by NPC with S3 radar at 11.7km away (here IR is the highest value between your IR and EM so used for the formula), by S2 at 8.775 km, by S1 at 5.85 km away. Many people think the Sentinel is a stealthy ship, when it is not atm ;) They are way more stealthier ships around.
If you power on all components you are above 100k EM, you are like a nice flash in the sky like that and detectable miles away ;)
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At what point during combat are you forced to 'go loud' and lose any element of stealth - presumably if you fire a gun or missile, but is there any firing you can ever 'get away with' while remaining undetected?
If you dont lock and are not detected you can alpha kill with the proper ship and setup, without powering up shield.
Going loud is when you have the advantage and are about to make the kill. Otherwise you will be at a disavantage, with your shield at zero if you just powered them on.
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What's the correct way to power stuff off and on, and when?
With such setup and ship you will be seen anyway at least from 5km away when powered off, so you will be at a disavantage, because opposition will be full shielded when you wont be.
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What's the correct use of the Sentinel's EMP. I know how to charge and fire it, but I'm not really using it yet.
Firing EMP when opposition shield is up is useless, it might down a side of a ship with 2*S1 shield but that is all, especially if you fire it too late (thus too far). You need to have ennemy shield down on one side first to make sure the remaining distortion damage will bypass the remaining shield to potentially shut down components. You need to remember than firing the EMP have a timer, so you have to release it accordingly to that unleash timer depending on which EMP ship you are using. Overclocking EMP will make more damage. On a side note, your setup is a mix of laser/ballistic, that is not the best weapon setup vs shield if you want to use EMP and turn a ship off, you can add some distortion damage (that is after all the basic loadout of the sentinel) which will also help turn components off.
So you have to drop their shields first and watch the ennemy EM signature. Some ships require multiple emp burst hits once a shield face is down. And if there is any shield left (any quadrant) it will absorb the bulk of the burst if you dont EMP again vs that downed shield side. It is only when all shield quadrant are down that any successive emp will significantly drop the EM readout on their ship. You can achieve the same with successive successfull EMP on the same quadrant of the ship if you can keep the ennemy ship at same distance and position in a fight. When low enough, the ship will shut down completly when your successive burst will down the distortion hp resistance of components. Only way for the ship to start up again is to power cycle the components (which can take a lot of time on some ships depending on which component is installed).
Atm at least EMP is good vs the shield, but it does not work all the time vs component like before (when a single EMP could turn off a full shielded ship like a Carrack). Some components are more resistant to EMP, and because of that the EMP of the Hawk and Raven is at the moment useless most of the time.

Cugino83 · Jun 29, 2021

I seocond all the @vahadar consideration and suggestion and I'll add some of mine:

What would you do when you get in your ship to set it up for stealth?

Weel first of all if you heading toard a stealth build looks for stealth components and weapons with a low stand-by emission.
Try to balance the power output with the signature and, in case of ships with reduntant components, remember they are not required to be identical, so you can mound a stealth powerplant alongside an industrial one, switching off the sedcond while not in combat.
Also you can bing key to tun off weapons, shiled and engine (deactivating weapons also take off the landing gear, it's a known bugs), that also help to reduce your signature (especially usefull while mining)

Do you do anything in particular if you hope to travel somewhere undetected, e.g. while mining

Well see above.. Especially while ROC mining I alsways torun off the engine: fist it prevent the ship to bounch off the ground and stay in the air, and second it reduce the signature.
So far so goo and never had any unpleasant encounter.

Do you do anything in particular if some other ship appears as a friendly/neutral/hostile and if it initiates combat with you?

That's a complex question and depend more on what are you using and your skills: are you in a Prospector? Then you are tosted not matter what.
Are you ina Vanguard? Are you confident to be able to take the agressor out? Then fight back and kick his ass.
Are you in a MSR? Hell is one of the fastest ship in the 'vers.... funking run, eventually a long range quantum jump solve the problem, the asshole will either desist or run out of fuel before catching you..
That's of course is a solution for hostile ships, neutral are NPC usually law enforcer so no problem, neutral... well it depend on the situation again.
As a general rule while mining I considere ANY ship that is not a Prospector or a MOLE a s a possible treath and move away as far and as fast as possibile.

Do you do anything in particular right before a fight that you initiate (e.g. before approaching a target's location while bounty hunting)?

Since the is always some delays on the target spawn I usually go decuple and set speed at around 500m/s... but that's not retatin to a stealth approach.
If you are going in with some components disabled I'll suggest to start powering something up, powergenerator and shield in particular since thy take time to charge, weapons eventually as a last thing while approaching range of engagement.

How can you best understand your own ship's ability to detect other ships? How can you improve (or what might impair) your own sensors' range and/or sensitivity?

See Vahadar reply that is the know actuall formula for calculating the detecting distance of a ship. For knowing what radar ship are equipped with looks at Erkul DPS calculator.
Keep in mind that right now there is no underground "noise" so you can't be totally invisible, soon (TM) there will be implementation of heat and IR noise that could mask compleately your singature... and that's will be the moment to have fun with stealth gameplay.

What can you tell about another ship's ability to detect you? Presumably some ships have better sensors than others?

Yes.. sort of. See the forumale alcunation and the future ambient noise. Still yes, right now bigger ship have better radars.

Do sensors/radar work equally well in all directions, or are they directional?

Yes, for the general passive radar it work in a 360° arc, for ping on the other hand you can adjust the arc of can "zooming" in a particular direction treading more distance for a narrow angle of ping.

What else can you do to try to detect another ship before it detects you (e.g. scanning), and is that a good or - as it would seem - a bad idea if you want to remain undetected?

Ping is the only option and NO, is not a viabile solution to remain undetected since it both spike your signature up and provide a visual effect of the ping.

Can you target or missile lock another ship without giving your presence/position away, or at least without revealing yourself as hostile to it?

Well you cna target another ship without being revealed on the radar, BUT that will let the target know that he is both targeted and there is a missile on them.
The radar lock advise is just there for this purpose: if someone, hostile or not, lock you up, that advise you.
Also notice that while radarlocking a ship is considering an offense, locking a missile it is and will mark you as an hostile for the target.

Is there any reason to NOT target a ship you intend to engage in combat, so that it doesn't realise it has been targeted?

As Vahadar state, you don't need a radar lock for firing upon a ship and not locking prevent the target to know someone is possibile aiming at them. Keep in ming in space that is VERY difficult approach for a stealth attack sicne you very likely can't see the target, you lacks pips calculation and you still need to keep a good distance form the target to prevent him to have a radar contact of you.

What does that RDR LOCK alarm in the cockpit mean? It lights and sounds LONG before I detect bounty target ships.

RDR LOCK means someone (player or NPC alike) have your ship on the radar AND have you radar lock. Since the radar contact is define by the ship signature is very likely tha a hight signature ship will be seen before you can see your target.
If you receive that warning will very likely means trouble since very few player radar lock a friendly ship if they do not mean to attack it.

At what point during combat are you forced to 'go loud' and lose any element of stealth - presumably if you fire a gun or missile, but is there any firing you can ever 'get away with' while remaining undetected?

Well if they are firing at you then you are no more stealth... so either "go loud" or run far enought so that you drop off theyr detecting distance.

What's the correct way to power stuff off and on, and when?

There is no correct sequence that all depend on your ship, configuration and situation.
A powerplant and a cooler are mandatory for a ship to work all the other stuff is optional so you are to decide, keep in mind that shield need to recharge and while doing so your signature will spike up do to the extra energy consumption.
Knowing that play your move accordingly on your plan: if you are on a Eclipse and plan to fire a torpedo at a big ship... probably you'll be able to engage it outside his detection range and you could eventually not turn on the shileds for exaple.... in a Sabre that is more unlikely to happen and could be a better choice to have some shields on anyway if not all of them if you choose stealth component.

What's the correct use of the Sentinel's EMP. I know how to charge and fire it, but I'm not really using it yet.

I think Vahadar explain it well enogth, keep in mind that being closer to a ship is generally better since you can fully "hit" the ship with the EMP blaast.

vahadar · Jun 29, 2021

Something worth mentionning when you want to engage someone without a radar lock :

As Cugino mentionned it is not an easy task in space. But you can use 2 things to know what you have in front of you when you DO NOT lock a ship and are lurking in the shadows :
- you scanner (not actively scanning by pinging), by just pointing your nose to the pip and holding the trigger to passively scan for ship type and life on board, you wont be detected doing so. If you are after bounties and the pip is red, there is a high chance it is your bounty but you can check the name like that.
- you radar :) and move according to the ship position on radar as long as you do not see it in your HUD.

Hunting players bounties without a lock is more difficult in space, because the target is in general moving or on alert already. In general I try to do a single "zoom and boom" before escaping and going back loud to finish him when needed (or I just run away and play cat and mouse ^^). Doing an undetected "zoom and boom" sometime allows you to aim perfectly at the target, as you can zoom in your HUD and reduce your FOV (80%) to have a better reticle for aiming when zoomed, so you can shoot a specific part of the ship (like wings). Zooming HUD here is not related to the term "zoom" in the "zoom and boom" tactic, "zoom and boom" means fly fast and hit hard in multiple flyby.
I prefer to hunt bounties on planets/moons, when they are repairing or griefing poor miners, and as long as you stay in the shadows you have a good chance to score an alpha kill depending on the ship type (i love ballistic cannons for that purpose^^).

vahadar · Jun 29, 2021

That means a kill on first shot (first alpha strike damage). Alpha strike meaning for damage (full damage at same time) is unlike dps damage (damage over time here per second).
Canons have better alpha than repeaters for example.

Shadow Reaper · Jun 29, 2021

A few additional observations:

Although all sensors are currently omni-directional, the plan is to have very highly directional sensors in the future. Once we get swappable components for radar and sensors (looks they'll be a single package) you'll be able to choose if you want directional. Birds like the Tracker are supposed to actually come with directional. So even though the Tracker is S1 radar, it should eventually have the S2 multiplier (0.75 instead of 0.50), but it will only search a small portion of the sky like that, so needs active attention. This is the idea behind the Terrapin as well. If indeed we can add that capability to any ship and bump it up to the next sensor size, the Apollo is going to certainly come into its own, moving from 1.0 to 1.5 (cap class). How cool would it be to remove the turret on the Sentinel and replace it with directional S3 radar? Count me in!

You have heavy shields. Your stealth is really designed around shields off, so the max cooling rate is relatively unimportant. You're not going to go back into stealth after attacking/unzipping your fly during a conflict. That being the case, you can get a small improvement by going twin Nightfalls. You will get a very large improvement to shields by swapping out one of the FR-76 for a Sukoran, but you'll need to buy a Defender to get your hands on one.

Most know but no one noted: when you switch your stealth switch on, what you're doing is losing about 1/4 your IR and raising EM slightly. Since IR is your higher signal (with shields off), this is a good trade. It will put you down around 8k IR which means a small ship needs to be within 4k to spot you. Since you have medium sensors, you can spot most small ships at 6km. This is what you asked about, but note this is a one-time gig. As soon as you fire up the shields or engines your advantage is over. You get one missile strike, and if you choose all S3 missiles, you can strike from outside detection range. The Sentinel is not stealthy until you factor in the medium sensor suite. It can usually see before it is seen. It's also noteworthy that there are no S3 stealth components, so the Ninjutsu competition is exclusively between small and medium ships. You do have the advantage here. Yes, the Eclipse will see you before you see it, but very few other ships are this way. No nonstealth ships are this way and they're your primary targets, including ALL Vanduul ships.

I have compared many different weapons loadouts and I am still skeptical that attacking shields is the way to go. While I like the M7A/BVRS combo you've chosen, that is only because I think it is super worthwhile to be able to hit from long range if your opponent cannot. It is just a general case choice, to recognize the value in sniping. Most ships can't carry S5 guns, so if you choose an S5 with great range, you can snipe from outside their weapons range, though not necessarily their missile range. Memorize what bounties have S3 missiles available, such as HH. You can't snipe the HH safely.

General choices don't apply once you know you have a specific target type. If you know your target is going to be large and easy to hit, you should be using cannons as on the Harby. If you know you're fighting a small number of hard to hit fighters, you should be using the BVRS. If you know you'll be facing dozens of opponents before you can refit, you should be using energy repeaters.

Finally, let me suggest the single greatest use case for the Sentinel is as a long range stealth bomber flown in wings--Sentinel with Harby package. There is nothing in game thus far that suggests multiple targets appear on radar more quickly than single targets, meaning a target cannot spot six incoming Vanguards at greater range than it can spot one. What this means is wings of small and medium attackers have an extreme advantage over a smaller number of large or cap class ships. This means Vanguards should fly in wings. So buddy up here at TEST. This is the place to be.

vahadar · Jun 29, 2021

Shadow Reaper said:
Most know but no one noted: when you switch your stealth switch on, what you're doing is losing about 1/4 your IR and raising EM slightly.

Good point, and good to remind this ! I thought it wasnt working anymore like that. That is indeed important if IR is your highest signature.

Shadow Reaper · Jun 30, 2021

Honestly, I see more vids of Sentinels doing bounty missions than any other ship. Opinions of proper loadout vary wildly, but in general:

If you load the XL-1 military grade A drive, when bounties jump you can usually jump after them, arrive before them, set in stealth and drop 37k points Thunderbolts on them, twice. That will get anyone's attention.

I see lots of vids of Sentinels using the stock weapons to kill HHs. I don't know what to make of these vids. I haven't flown the missions but it never looks like the HH is shooting back, so what sort of "mission" is that? Still, these guys are killing lots of HHs in missions. Check youtube, says "kill two shield faces first, then pulse". Keep in mind that the EMP is only effective from 600 to 2200 meters. If the target is inside 600 meters it does not take distortion damage.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aag8yjOrqLI

Note that in this vid, in the first kill he is "orbiting" the target by strafing sideways (right) while turning into the straif (left), which creates a "death spiral" or orbit around the target with nose pointed to the center. This is a favorite brawler tactic in Mechwarrior. The escape from this attack is pretty simple, accelerate out as fast as you can. I'm surprised the targets aren't escaping, but I guess the AI is not very good and the HH is not very fast. It is very possible this orbit tactic is why the HH is not firing back. What is supposed to happen is the attacker is crossing each turret's field of view so quickly they don't have time to get a clean shot. I dunno. It should not be this effective against real players, but seems to be working here. He is doing this right. The Vanguard will strafe along the X axis fastest, which means you want to go strafe left or right at highest possible rate continuous, and the target is wobbling in center screen because he is tapping the yaw again and again to adjust. The closer you can orbit the faster you will cross each turret's field of view and the safer you'll be, and he could go closer until he is at max yaw, but he is keeping the target at proper distance for his EMP. Brilliantly done.

If you can get your hands on a Sukoran and pair that with one of your FR-76s, you will have incredible shields and can tank amazing DPS, including all ballistic damage. No matter what an opponent throws at you, you will come out of it with no damage to your hull so long as you keep a careful eye on the shields. The problem with the Sukoran is it does not refresh for something like 15 seconds after first injury, but then refreshes faster than the FR and with higher shield points. This is solved by pairing it with the FR-76. So if you can afford a Defender or Prowler, you can fly a tank. That's not only good for bounties but team play into the future.

Note too that buying a Defender is also the only way to get hold of the Singe 2 tachyon cannons. I haven't seen anyone run them yet, but their interesting issue is they used to be and may be again instantaneous to target, so no lead time/distance needed. They are still listed as very fast, and we'll see what happens with them. Even nerfed they ought to hit VERY often fired from the Sentinel turret, making them an extremely interesting defensive choice, perhaps even against missiles and torps. No one has tried this yet so far as I know, but "instantaneous" or just very fast is a serious quality to consider, especially when combined with full turret assist. If a good REO can neutralize all incoming missiles and torps, well. . .that's a big deal. Makes those little guns not so little. Overclocked, the Singe ought to fire 5-6 times when a missile or torp is in range, so methinks there is a fair chance to hit even small missiles. Certainly worth a try if you can find a REO. Try Blind Owl, Graptor, Vahadar, Cujino, Dirtbag_Leader, Ayeteeone, Bambooza, or just put an add in general looking for Vanguard enthusiasts to do some testing. We'd all love to know about this and whether the Nox fits in the back of any Vanguard. There are MANY Vanguard pilots in TEST.

Also, if you need it to go faster, paint red racing stripes on it. . .

vahadar · Jun 30, 2021

Raven_King said:
One other thing in that video surprised me, in a good way. He looked to me like he is able to fire his distortion scattergun and laser repeaters independently of each other - so has them in different weapon groups, and ALSO seems to be able to charge and unleash his EMP independently of the other two weapon groups. I thought you could only have two weapon groups at the moment. Can you have more now?

It is just an impression you have.
He is using the scattergun and the repeater on the same group. It is very seen many times in the video (like right at the start when the repeaters are shot same time as the scattergun and not in burst, because of each trigger press to shoot the scattergun).
Since the scattergun is not a repeating weapon, he just have to press the trigger with a small timer each time he wants to use it, and needs to just hold the trigger if he wants to fire continuously after with the repeaters only (and sometime releases and press again the trigger to fire a single shot of scattergun as seen in the video like at 01:07).
So the second trigger is used for the EMP only (second weapon group) as you can also see in the video like at 8:08 and then the guns are used.

Shadow Reaper · Jun 30, 2021

There are several things about the vid I don't understand. Why are there 2 weapon signatures instead of just the one chin mount? Makes me wonder if he's still flying the Carrack remote turret on his chin, but I thought that was over ages ago. He did walk around in the vid below and there was no turret.

If you're saying he is inside 600 meters, and the EMP worked anyway, I don't have an answer. He didn't look that close to me. I just rewatched the scene at time index 8m and though the distance is too blurry to read, most of the time it is reading 4 digits, so I think he is outside 600 meters. He says he is using distortion scatterguns. The HH is a big ship so it's easy to be further from it than you'd guess. I do know a LOT of people have complained that the EMP doesn't work at all, and every time I have investigated this it turned out they did not know EMP area effects are hollow shells with an inner radius of no effect; and they were just too close.

If I were doing this and could get a Distortion Scattergun, that would be my first choice for the nose mounts, and an Attrition 5 for the chin. No ammo costs means more profit. Strange erkul doesn't list an S2 distortion scattergun. Stranger he has 2 red weapons signatures coming off a nose with a single weapon. Maybe that is the signature of an Attrition?

View: https://youtu.be/vYyVRnyVXM8

Dirtbag_Leader · Jun 30, 2021

I was pretty intrigued by that video; anyone tried running 2x S5 distortion scatterguns like that along with the two stock gimballed omniskys on a Connie? Any good?

vahadar · Jun 30, 2021

Shadow Reaper said:
If I were doing this and could get a Distortion Scattergun, that would be my first choice for the nose mounts, and an Attrition 5 for the chin. No ammo costs means more profit. Strange erkul doesn't list an S2 distortion scattergun. Stranger he has 2 red weapons signatures coming off a nose with a single weapon. Maybe that is the signature of an Attrition?

I guess he is running a mix of single fixed S5 absolution scattergun, and the rest is 4 GVRS laser repeaters.
At some point I also had the impression I saw only 2 red weapons signature, thinking the nose mount was probably the old exploit with carrack turret too, but it might just be another visual impression, because if you pause when he is shooting the laser only, you will see 4 rays of light (exemple at 0:43) but almost on top of each others.

edit :

Raven_King said:
1 x Absolution Distortion Scattergun (size 5), 4 x GVSR repeaters (size 2).

then indeed confirmed

vahadar · Jun 30, 2021

Dirtbag_Leader said:
I was pretty intrigued by that video; anyone tried running 2x S5 distortion scatterguns like that along with the two stock gimballed omniskys on a Connie? Any good?

That is my ship for ERT and hammerheads, Connie with 2*S5 absolution, and 2*S4 attrition. Very fast kills.

Shadow Reaper · Jun 30, 2021

Raven_King said:
I suppose parts of a large target ship may be >600m away and thus its hitbox intersects the shell of the EMP pulse, when the target marker says it's closer than that?

I guess that sounds reasonable. It is pretty rare for erkul to be wrong, but the devs have never said how they measure distance to a ship for EMP.

BTW, I think the guy making the vids above was mistaken when he said he was running distortion scatterguns, since there are no S2 distortion scatterguns. I think the nose is carrying 4 Dominance 2 laser scatterguns, which do very high damage at that distance since all the pellets hit. Combined with an Attrition 5 and overclocked you're looking at ~5,200 dps and you can go on forever. This is one tactic where energy weapons make good sense, specifically because you can take your time to kill something when it can't hit you.

A couple years back I was looking at the Razor EX, which I am loving for miniaturized stealth recon to fly off a Polaris and spot for it, and I noted you could actually attack a large ship like a Void Bomber with a handful of such scouts if you needed to by using this orbiting tactic. (I like calling it "circle strafe" and won't complain but the "death spiral" name has some years on it--maybe twenty?) The Razor needs to circle on the Y axis where it gets about 2 1/2 times the acceleration of the Vanguard, so it can literally whip around in circles--accelerating up while rotating down--fast enough to make your head spin. Still waiting to see how the Razor flies with its control surfaces cut away, as they're not needed in space and without them, you could fit an entire wing inside a Polaris hangar bay, or better maybe, a couple Razors and a Mantis. The Polaris needs stealth recon that can fly out dozens of km ahead and light up targets for the Polaris S10 torps, and manage against the very fast Vanduul scout craft. The Razor is faster, more maneuverable and very hard to see compared to the Vanduul fighters so a good match save that it has crappy firepower. Best choice is probably the Dominance 2 laser scattergun.

Can someone explain how to employ stealth, and the limits of its usefulness?

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