Fight ships (L & XL)

Introduction

There are currently 15 Large and Extra Large ships that are designated as "Fight". In addition, there are 2 XL "Trade" ships that blur the edges around Fight/Trade due to the way they are used by NPC pirates (Titurel) and the heavily-armed way they are outfitted (Lyramekron). 

Statistics for all of them can be found in the table below (based on ship data linked from here).

Ship stats for 2 XL "Trade" ships and 15 L and XL "Fight" ships (click on heading to sort)

1. Full price estimated using encyclopaedia base prices:

• Hull: Encyclopaedia base price (approximately equal to 2 x sum cost of all components at their base price).
• SE (Surface Elements): Sold by shipyards at approximately 2 x base costs (1 Capital Field Generator = 3 FFPs).
• Crew: 250 k Cr assumed cost (75k Captain; 35k Engineer; 140k DO).
• L ship Drones: 1.2 M k Cr assumed cost (5 constructors and 10 Interceptor Mk I).
• XL ship Drones: 2.3 M k Cr assumed cost (10 constructors and 20 Interceptor Mk I).
• Xenon and Split weapon costs estimated from human counterparts (HIT/MA or Plasma/MA) multiplied by the ratio of their respective DPS stats.
• Xenon I hull price estimated from the observation that hull prices increase linearly for L and XL non-Teladi Fight ships as total HP increases (R2 = 0.97).

2. DPS (>4 km): Excludes Hailstorm and HIT/MA Turrets (details).
3. Pitch presented to give a feel for manoeuvrability; stats for roll and yaw are also in-game.
4. When attacking from long range, the Balor's initial missile DPS will be 3-times higher (24k) since the first 3 volleys will detonate close together.
5. The Stromvok has an internal drone bay that can't be targeted or destroyed.
6. The Sucellus IHC can only shoot forwards due to being spinally mounted (details).
7. These are Trade-class vessels with strong combat abilities, therefore included on this table.
8. Arawn hull does not factor in tough (~1000k hull?) destructible outriggers. These can potentially absorb some of the damage aimed at the hull giving it more equivalent hull than listed.
11. The Phoenix Marauder is unique as a Combat-class vessel with an Universal cargo bay. Interplay with TTO standings and piracy.

General trends

Many factors will feature in the value individuals will place on different ships, such as DPS, hip points, looks, speed and fire arcs. With the notable exceptions of the Teladi Condor and Phoenix hulls (TTO DLC), hitpoint and DPS tend to increase with cost (often at the expense of manoeuvrability).

Manoeuvrability: As ship hit points (and size) increase, speed and agility tend to decrease. The Condor and Phoenix are special here - in spite of their XL-class designation, their manoeuvrability is more akin to L-class. 

HP/Credit Ratio: When the table above is sorted alphanumerically by the Total HP / Cr column, the Lyramekron stands out as having a substantially higher ratio than other ships, while the Stromvok comes in second.. The Teladi ships are once again notable for having very poor cost-to-HP ratio (probably to compensate for their high manoeuvrability).

DPS/Credit Ratio: The Fulmekron, Olmekron, and Lyramekron rank at the top of the cost-to-DPS ratio. In the L-category, the Stromvok is notable for ranking above the Suls.

Shield vs Armour: Shield strength is generally preferable over hull, since shield recharge is significantly faster than hull repair. Additionally, only hull strength seems to be factored into a ship's cost (AL ships favor shields while OL ships favor hull).

Total DPS: Ships with Area of Effect (AoE) weapons often have a deceptively low DPS value. But such weapons (such as missiles, HIVI and IHC) tend to be underrated as they can deal damage to multiple surface elements at once in addition to the hull, thereby rapidly incapacitating an enemy ship.

Ship-specific notes

The Fulmekron and Xenon I rank at the very top in terms of raw DPS. It is debatable which one deals more damage: While the Fulmekron has an edge in turret output, the Xenon I has a large number of internal missile bays (2x Novadrone, 6x Sunstalker) that are indestructible. Moreover, the Xenon I features both significantly stronger hull and shield, and should rightly be hailed as the king of capital ships.

The Arawn is unusual in that a significant portion of its firepower are allocated to Hailstorm and HIT/MA turrets (only 39% of its DPS can reach beyond 4km). This is contrary to the armament trend for XL combat ships. It does make a very effective anti-fighter platform, and in spite of its shortcomings, it still retains a 25% long-range DPS and 146% HP advantage over the Taranis, and should not be underestimated.

The Gangrene Chaser's unique armament (Ragefire turret) combines excellent projectile speed with high DPS output, which makes it adept against fighters and capitals alike.

The Sucellus is notable for being the cheapest XL-class combat ship with an excellent cost-to-HP ratio. The downside is 30% of its DPS come from the spinal-mounted IHC, which is generally inoperable below 6km due to the vanilla capital combat script preferring to manoeuver the ship for broadsides. There are mods available that improve its utilisation of the IHC.

The Balor's Nova torpedoes have a range of 50km, though in practice this is limited by the ship's 24km radar range. This is still significantly longer any other weapon range in the game (typically <8km). Unfortunately it suffers from the same issue as the Sucellus due to the vanilla capital combat script, and tends to fly straight into a fight rather than stay at range. There are mods available that improve its utilisation of the torpedoes.

The Phoenix Marauder, like many Teladi capitals, is extremely agile. Furthermore, as of XR 4.0 it is one of the fastest combat capital ships at 95m/s (second only to the Balor, which has 96m/s). This makes it an excellent patrol ship as well as a good freighter for making speedy, high-value trade runs (thanks to its Universal cargo bay).