The “Holy Shit” drives

[Shadow Reaper]

I was mindlessly meandering Q Drive specs, because I am that kind of nerd; and noted again that larger Q drives go faster in general. Efficiency of drives is harder to track than ever. I dunno why CIG complicated this by taking out the raw numbers we used to use.

While so meandering I noted the S3 military drive, the TS-2 is actually a lot faster than the Capital class drive in the Polaris. So the Carrack can be faster than the corvette class Polaris. Shouldn’t be so but the Polaris is 344k/s and the Carrack can be fitted to 395k/s. Cool if you love the Carrack.

Then I checked the Idris, which also has a cap class Q Drive. It flies at a shocking 718k/s, both the M and P. So what are the implications?

One implication is certainly that Idris should not be teamed with ships that don’t fit in her hangar. If you want to make use of the shocking intercept time and reduced travel time of the Idris, you need to fly it solo or with other Idris. No Polaris or anything else. So count me here advocating for paired and trembled Idris quick response task forces.

As the Kraken is about to debute, keep an eye on for this stat. My guess is Drake is not going to match Aegis here, which means you don’t want to combine Idris and Kraken, and very likely you’ll want to prioritize the Idris in flexible, quick response planning. The 890 Jump’s Q Drive returns to the “bigger is faster” sequence and has a nice 514k/s figure, but it’s useless for fleet operations. The Idris is not. 718k is a true “holy shit” drive.

 

[Ayeteeone]

The Polaris doesn't use a Capital class drive. It fits a size 3, just like the Carrack. In the current patch it also has more QT fuel so can travel farther.

I'd expect the Kraken to use a Size 4 drive, and probably come up short against the Idris for range. We shall see.

 

[Shadow Reaper]

My bad. You are correct. What I took as a fixed S4 drive in the Polaris is an S3, and indeed can be fitted with a faster drive. The S4 in the 890 is faster still and the S4 in the Idris is way faster. So the rule that bigger is faster is indeed intact. Makes one wonder what they’ll do with the Javelin.

The point remains though, if you want to get the rapid response and reduced time out of the Idris, you can’t pair it with ships it’s not carrying. Maybe that means Idris merely arrive on the scene first, and are later backed up by much slower craft. Maybe it means one just organize so everything fits on your Idris.

 

[FZD]

92 second cooldown time though. Unless it's a straight jump to the target, Polaris probably has Idris beat.

 

[Shadow Reaper]

Yes, it depends upon the jump. I think though what we’ll see are Idris P and K make long jumps and arrive close enough to their targets to launch strike groups, but not close enough to be sensed. Just seems a good precaution, and one more reason I support stealth strike groups of Liberators, Polaris and Idris. There’s nothing good can come from alerting an enemy to your location.

I have not seen any careful figures on what will fit on the Idris flight deck, but at 200x25m, 5 Eclipse and 10 Wolf sounds like a good start. The M class Idris does not need to wait on its strike group to drop the target’s shields since its gun is ballistic, so there’s some serious difference in combat tactics between the M and the P & K. The M may want to be bolder and use the Destroyer to take out internal components. Seems reasonable.

Either way, Eclipse torps launched from close range is better than using the main gun on an Idris.