Ships

Ships are used to traverse space. As with previous Elite games, [1][2][3][4] there will be a variety of designs.

There will be 30 different playable ships in addition to some non-playable ones at launch, with each manufacturer having its own unique style. Some will have variant versions, and each will have a huge range of different equipment levels, so they could be equipped as freighters, attack ships, explorers, etc.

Choosing a ship

All commanders start out with a Sidewinder. You may choose to upgrade the components of your Sidewinder, and make it fit your purposes. Or you may upgrade to an entirely new ship. So, what ship should you choose?

Multi-purpose

Your starting Sidewinder, and the ever popular Cobra, among others, are multi-purpose ships. This means they can be modified through outfitting to be suitable for a wide range of purposes. You can choose to make it into a versatile fighter, and still have some cargo room over to pick up spoils of war. Or you can outfit it with powerful sensors and big fuel tanks for exploration in deep space. Because of their versatility, this is the type of ship you will most often see people use.

Fighter

If you favor combat, you will want to use a fighter. If two equally skilled pilots face off against each other, the one who has the fighter will win most often. This is because of the speed and agility of fighters enables you to dodge heavy fire and still deliver stinging blows to the back of your enemy. Downside to running a fighter is that they don't have cargo space to pick up dropped loot, so profit is based on kill warrants mostly.

Freighter

Traders who want to engage in some space trucking, you will want to pick up a freighter with plenty of storage room for cargo. These freighters are slow and cumbersome, so often an easy prey for pirates. Therefore, it might be well worth to bring protection in form of a couple of buddies in fighters, if you have the chance. If pirates destroy your ship, insurance will get you your ship back, but all the cargo will be lost, which can be a significant financial blow.

Passenger

Couriers who fly passengers and valuable items with small storage requirements have a special class of ships available to them. These ships are elegant and fast, designed to quickly and comfortably get from one system to the next. You can think of them as giant limousines for space.

Current Playable Ships

Model	Type**	Price (CR)	Initial Cargo	Max Cargo (No shields)	Jump Range*** (~Light Years)	Speed [Boost]	Hull Mass
Sidewinder Mk. I	Multipurpose 0	32,000*	4	10	7.56	220 [320]	25
Eagle Mk. II	Fighter 5	44,800	2	14	8.47	250 [350]	50
Zorgon Peterson Hauler	Freighter 0	52,720	8	22	9.87	200 [300]	14
Viper Mk. III	Fighter 6	142,931	4	22	6.92	309 [386]	60
Cobra Mk. III	Multipurpose 3	379,718	18	60	10.46	280 [400]	180
Lakon Type 6 Transporter	Freighter 4	1,045,945	50	112	12.39	220 [350]	155
Asp Explorer	Multipurpose 5	6,661,153	38	128	13.2	254 [345]	280
Imperial Clipper	Multipurpose 7	22,295,860	42	184	8.25	290 [370]	500
Federal Dropship	Multipurpose 7	37,814,205	56	164	7.25	182 [300]	580
Orca	Passenger 5	48,539,887	72	96		300 [380]	580
Python	Multipurpose 7	56,978,179	82	292		250 [280]	350
Lakon Type-9 Heavy	Freighter 9	76,555,842	220	532	17.722	130 [200]	1000
Anaconda	Multipurpose 8	146,969,451	114	468	19.555	180 [240]	400

*Note the sidewinder is available for free via insurance.
** Ship types in classes 0 - 9 where 0 is most basic and 9 is most advanced and 5 is mid-range. Meant to be used for sorting purposes.
*** No cargo, default loadout, full fuel.

Considerations

• The in-shipyard prices are modified by the value of your current ship and supply/demand. It is not the true value of the ship. Generate costs from the insurance.

• Note that prices will vary greatly between star ports and are modified by the resell value of your current ship, Lakons and Anacondas in particular undergo a significant markup, expect to pay up to double the values in the table. The above prices are the based of the insurance values which are currently the only way to find the true value of a ship.

• Beta 2.04: The ship (and modules!) you sell, is sold at 90% it's value (you lose 10%).
  • As your modules are sold at 90% value when buying a new ship, sell/swap your modules to cheaper ones, if possible, in the outfitting, as you get 100% the price there, so in the end the 10% you lose, will be from a less expensive module (I would expect this to be fixed to a 10% loss as well at some stage. Would make sense, so buyer beware).

• Given you know the value of your current ship (use the table above) you can then calculate the real price of the rest of the ships the current shipyard offers. Just add 90% of the base value of the ship you are in to the price listed (this assumes your current ship is standard fitted only - else add 90% value of modules as well)

• Here are some more detailed ship stats, which include things such as turnrates, which should be added to this page soon.

Upcoming Ships

There will be 30 playable ships in total.

• Adder
• Beluga Liner
• Dolphin
• Fer de Lance
• Krait
• Lakon Type 7 (previously known as the Freighter 3)
• Panther Clipper
• The Hunter
• Imperial Courier

Available Outfitting on Ships

All ships are highly customizable through outfitting. Each outfit slot has a maximum class that can be put into that slot. This only lists what type of outfit slots are available for each ship, their exact content has to be put on some other page. For example: Internal compartments can contain cargo space, where class 1 = 2t, class 2 = 4t, class 3 = 8t, class 4 = 16t... But Internal compartments can also contain shield capacitors, scanners, etc. Apart from classes, outfits also have a quality rating A-H, and other characteristics such as energy drain, armor piercing, etc.

Max class for each outfit slot in table below (more info on respective ship page):

	Sidewinder	Eagle	Hauler	Viper	Cobra	Type-6	Asp	Imperial Clipper	Federal Dropship	Orca	Python	Type-9	Anaconda
Small Hardpoints	2	3	1	2	2	2	4	0	0	0	0	2	2
Medium Hardpoints	0	0	0	2	2	0	2	2	4	2	2	3	2
Large Hardpoints	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	2	1	1	3	0	3
Huge Hardpoints	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1
Utility Mounts	2	1	2	2	2	3	4	4	4	4	4	4	8
Bulkheads	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	8	8
Reactor Bay	2	2	2	3	4	3	5	6	6			6	8
Thrusters Mounting	2	3	2	3	4	4	5	6	6			7	7
Frame Shift Drive Housing	2	3	2	3	4	4	5	5	5			6	6
Environment Control	1	1	1	2	3	2	4	5	5			5	5
Power Coupling	1	2	1	3	3	3	4	6	6			6	8
Sensor Suite	1	2	1	3	3	2	5	5	4			4	8
Fuel Store	1	2	3	2	4	4	5	4	4			6	5
Internal Compartments	2 C2 1 C1	1 C3 1 C2 1 C1	2 C3 1 C2 1 C1	2 C3 1 C2 1 C1	3 C4 3 C2	2 C5 2 C4 1 C3 2 C2	2 C6 1 C5 3 C3 2 C2	2 C6 2 C4 2 C3 2 C2	1 C6 2 C5 1 C4 2 C3 1 C2	2 C5 1 C4 1 C3 2 C2	3 C6 2 C5 1 C4 2 C3 1 C2	1 C8 1 C7 1 C6 1 C5 2 C4 2 C3 1 C2	1 C7 3 C6 3 C5 3 C4 1 C2

Manufacturers

Core Dynamics

• Eagle
• Condor
• Farragut
• Federal Dropship

Faulcon DeLacy

• Sidewinder
• Viper
• Cobra
• Anaconda

Lakon

• Asp Explorer
• Type 6 Transporter
• Type 9 Heavy

Gutamaya

• Imperial Clipper

Saud Kruger

• Orca

Zorgon Peterson

• Hauler
• Python
• Panther Clipper

Faction Ships

Frontier are developing a family of ships for the navies of each faction in the game. Examples:

• Empire Fighter - Empire Fighter
• Imperial Courier - Empire Scout
• Imperial Cutter - civilian version of Empire Light Warship
• Majestic Class Interdictor - Empire Capital Ship
• F63 Condor - Federal Fighter
• Farragut - Federal Capital Ship

The fleet-class ships that are available to the game’s major factions follow a hierarchy.

Cruisers (Battle cruisers, Battleships, Interdictors)

Long range, independent ships that are capable of controlling entire systems. Heavily armed and capable of deploying large fighter squadrons. The capital ships already shown are an example of this class. In the Empire they are usually known as “Interdictors” – named after the first successful class of cruisers. Currently the most common and most successful is the Majestic class – generally referred to as a “Majestic class Interdictor”. As ships that can also carry out ambassadorial missions they can be used for ‘soft’ power projection, as well as hard.

Frigates

These are large ships designed for escort duties. The actual vessels vary greatly between navies, but are all designed to engage multiple small, fast enemies (typically fighters and missile swarms) and are loaded with point defense batteries. They will also have some anti-ship capability, but are not designed to go up against other warships.

Destroyers

These are anti-warship vessels, but are generally no longer used in the front line, though some are still in service.

Carriers

Designed for the deployment of fighter squadrons. Obsolete in the fleets of the major factions due to the popularity of Cruisers, but small navies still make use of them and some have even been converted into transporters.

Transporters (Couriers)

Armored warships designed specifically for transporting valuable assets and cargo quickly and safely.

Corvettes (Cutters)

Light multi-role warships, capable of recon, incursions and escort missions. These small warships are also popular with smaller factions, organizations and even wealthy individuals due to their adaptability. The Imperial Cutter is a lighter and faster Corvette-class ship, which players will be able to get their hands on in the final game (assuming they can make the right contacts).

Fighters

Small short-range craft that generally cannot operate independently due to having no jump capability. Their main roles include the defense of stations and the large warships that they are deployed from. Commercial fighters are typically jump-capable and are therefore much more flexible than their faction-specific counterparts.

Drones

Small automated ships that have largely been phased out due to the existence of effective counter-measures.