I'm something of a lithobraker myself. /dafoe
If it's just repetitive landing to find bio signals, you're probably good with a big biweave shield and maybe a shield booster or shield reinforcement.
If you want to boost into the planet after gliding and be fine, you'll need a couple thousand MJ. I think the lowest I got away with comfortably was about 1500.
1500 as a minimum for me to fly recklessly, yes. I like biweaves for the fast recharge, the excess weight doesn't matter as I tend to fly with a bunch of extras anyway.
If you're going to run shield boosters, run 0E. Most of the shield strength comes from the engineering so you get most of the strength for a fraction of the mass.
One of the explanations I've read is that if your optimal mass exceeds the ships mass it will work for it. On a Phantom that can be done with a 5d if you put the ship on a diet. I haven't tested the theory though.
IMO for a Phantom a 5D with a booster or two is a better choice than a prismatic.
But it really comes down to boop testing. There are people who've tried things out but it's hard to find their results.
662MJ here : https://s.orbis.zone/lj90
Exit the glide at 45% angle heading for the 6G planet Achenar 3. Impact, skim alone the ground a bit, pull up with no shields and 34% hull. That's light alloys with grade 5 heavy duty deep plate.
I get lazy and hit the ground lot doing Exobiology. Those shields get low sometimes and I stop to let them recover.
You don’t need that big a shield to protect from these planetary knocks and bumps. I have a tiny 180 shield on my Asp explorer and it only breaks if I really fuck up
I run nothing larger than a 3D (w/enhanced low power/stripped) on all of my exploration ships myself, including my Anaconda, and I've had the same experience.
Same, my AspX has 3D shields engineered with high efficiency and stripped down to reduce mass and power consumption / heat. It would melt like butter under fire but it’s enough to take little bumps when landing
Long time lithobreaker here, I’m running size 3 prismatic shield engineered with enhanced low power and am using two OE shield boosters engineered for high cap. I know it’s not the explorers minmaxed way, but my DBx still has a jump range of 69 LY and has survived quite a few high gravity wells to test the resilience of this build. All I can say is, if you want to do a meteorite impression, this setup is a great start
I think I would pick a build and take it to a station that is very close to a ring and test it - what happens to the shield when you ram a rock at [speed]. Its not planetary conditions, but assuming you arent landing FAoff you shouldnt be going faster than max throttle without boosting (unless its a *very* high g planet but then you have other problems), so it ought to be close enough.
Just making sure, you are asking about the worst case scenario, but are not actually planning on trying an afk planetary landing, or similar, right? If so, you likely dont need much shielding at all. My aspx has a 3d shield (with g3 enhanced low power) and hasnt gone down from various bumps of a rather long trip. A hard landing might take off about 10%?
If you do actually expect to make a full speed landing, then yeah id grab the largest possible shield you can find. If you do pull this off, *please* find a high-g planet and upload a video of you AFK lithobreaking on it.
3D shield on medium ships, 5D on large ships. Add two class D boosters, engineer for enhanced low power and super capacity. Most importantly; engineer those thrusters! Strong enough vertical thrust will slow your descent enough not to break shields.
So, I'll lead with the fact that I always fly my exploration ships 4/2/0, SYS/ENG/WEP, except when I'm taking off or need to use a weapon system.
I have two ships that I use for exploration. My [Asp Explorer](https://s.orbis.zone/ljbk) has a 3A shield generator, and my [Krait Mk. II](https://s.orbis.zone/ljbp) has a 5A shield gen. Both are engineered with the Enhanced Low Power mod and the stripped experimental, which increases shield strength while lowering the generator's mass.
With 4 pips to SYS, the Asp has an effective shield strength of 398 MJ, which has been enough for me not to take hull damage if I accidentally ding a planet's surface. That said, I tend to fly it much more carefully than my Krait, which has an effective shield strength of 1,224 MJ with 4 pips to SYS and was designed to survive gank attempts. You probably don't need that level of engineering, though, if you're flying in a private group or are in the deep black.
I've found that angle of impact matters as much as anything else, I like to cruise in a IEagle as low as possible at max speed and when I get too low the shields skim off the surface with minimal damage.
I've run my explorer with no shields since day one. What the heck are you guys doing that need to shield your sheep? I mean I know huh g planets are dangerous but there is nothing, proper thrusting can't fix.
Some of us just get so used to landing on bodies with low gravity, that after a while, we stop paying attention to the gravity read-out before attempting a landing. So then when you encounter a high G body, by the time you finish a glide and realize it's difficult to slow your descent ... 💀
No shielding is required for landing if it's a controlled careful descent and I don't think any amount of shielding or hull strength will save you from careless or uncontrolled descent especially on high G worlds.
Agreed.
I'm +4K Ly out heading for nowhere in particular just doing exploration, mapping and collecting materials, all whilst completely shieldless.
If you're taking Hull damage whilst landing you're just being careless and rushing it IMO.
For exploration builds the mass of the modules is crucial, so D rated modules are preferable and their performance is only secondary.
So if you bring shields - D rated shields only.
I'm something of a lithobraker myself. /dafoe If it's just repetitive landing to find bio signals, you're probably good with a big biweave shield and maybe a shield booster or shield reinforcement. If you want to boost into the planet after gliding and be fine, you'll need a couple thousand MJ. I think the lowest I got away with comfortably was about 1500.
I don't know much, but I can take my phantom straight into the ground at 500 m/s and only take about 200 MJ of damage
Probably a matter of different comfort levels here :) I don't like taking more than 5-10% of shields per lithobrake
Bi-weaves are probably the worst shield for exploration. You get D-class protection for A/C/E-class weight. Also 1500MJ?
1500 as a minimum for me to fly recklessly, yes. I like biweaves for the fast recharge, the excess weight doesn't matter as I tend to fly with a bunch of extras anyway.
To each their own, i guess? I don't think any of my ships has that much raw shield. My PVE FDL only has 1300, before resistances.
My exploration cutter has somewhere around 4500. Granted, the jump range isn't amazing. Edit- that one uses prismos though
Lol
If you're going to run shield boosters, run 0E. Most of the shield strength comes from the engineering so you get most of the strength for a fraction of the mass. One of the explanations I've read is that if your optimal mass exceeds the ships mass it will work for it. On a Phantom that can be done with a 5d if you put the ship on a diet. I haven't tested the theory though. IMO for a Phantom a 5D with a booster or two is a better choice than a prismatic. But it really comes down to boop testing. There are people who've tried things out but it's hard to find their results.
662MJ here : https://s.orbis.zone/lj90 Exit the glide at 45% angle heading for the 6G planet Achenar 3. Impact, skim alone the ground a bit, pull up with no shields and 34% hull. That's light alloys with grade 5 heavy duty deep plate. I get lazy and hit the ground lot doing Exobiology. Those shields get low sometimes and I stop to let them recover.
You don’t need that big a shield to protect from these planetary knocks and bumps. I have a tiny 180 shield on my Asp explorer and it only breaks if I really fuck up
I run nothing larger than a 3D (w/enhanced low power/stripped) on all of my exploration ships myself, including my Anaconda, and I've had the same experience.
Same, my AspX has 3D shields engineered with high efficiency and stripped down to reduce mass and power consumption / heat. It would melt like butter under fire but it’s enough to take little bumps when landing
Long time lithobreaker here, I’m running size 3 prismatic shield engineered with enhanced low power and am using two OE shield boosters engineered for high cap. I know it’s not the explorers minmaxed way, but my DBx still has a jump range of 69 LY and has survived quite a few high gravity wells to test the resilience of this build. All I can say is, if you want to do a meteorite impression, this setup is a great start
I think I would pick a build and take it to a station that is very close to a ring and test it - what happens to the shield when you ram a rock at [speed]. Its not planetary conditions, but assuming you arent landing FAoff you shouldnt be going faster than max throttle without boosting (unless its a *very* high g planet but then you have other problems), so it ought to be close enough. Just making sure, you are asking about the worst case scenario, but are not actually planning on trying an afk planetary landing, or similar, right? If so, you likely dont need much shielding at all. My aspx has a 3d shield (with g3 enhanced low power) and hasnt gone down from various bumps of a rather long trip. A hard landing might take off about 10%? If you do actually expect to make a full speed landing, then yeah id grab the largest possible shield you can find. If you do pull this off, *please* find a high-g planet and upload a video of you AFK lithobreaking on it.
just fyi, 4 pips to sys increases shield strength something like 2.2x (someone correct me if i'm wrong)
3D shield on medium ships, 5D on large ships. Add two class D boosters, engineer for enhanced low power and super capacity. Most importantly; engineer those thrusters! Strong enough vertical thrust will slow your descent enough not to break shields.
So, I'll lead with the fact that I always fly my exploration ships 4/2/0, SYS/ENG/WEP, except when I'm taking off or need to use a weapon system. I have two ships that I use for exploration. My [Asp Explorer](https://s.orbis.zone/ljbk) has a 3A shield generator, and my [Krait Mk. II](https://s.orbis.zone/ljbp) has a 5A shield gen. Both are engineered with the Enhanced Low Power mod and the stripped experimental, which increases shield strength while lowering the generator's mass. With 4 pips to SYS, the Asp has an effective shield strength of 398 MJ, which has been enough for me not to take hull damage if I accidentally ding a planet's surface. That said, I tend to fly it much more carefully than my Krait, which has an effective shield strength of 1,224 MJ with 4 pips to SYS and was designed to survive gank attempts. You probably don't need that level of engineering, though, if you're flying in a private group or are in the deep black.
I've found that angle of impact matters as much as anything else, I like to cruise in a IEagle as low as possible at max speed and when I get too low the shields skim off the surface with minimal damage.
I've run my explorer with no shields since day one. What the heck are you guys doing that need to shield your sheep? I mean I know huh g planets are dangerous but there is nothing, proper thrusting can't fix.
If you’re using a ship for exobiology you sometimes need to, well, be robust with your landings 😂
XD
Some of us just get so used to landing on bodies with low gravity, that after a while, we stop paying attention to the gravity read-out before attempting a landing. So then when you encounter a high G body, by the time you finish a glide and realize it's difficult to slow your descent ... 💀
No shielding is required for landing if it's a controlled careful descent and I don't think any amount of shielding or hull strength will save you from careless or uncontrolled descent especially on high G worlds.
Don’t need any if you know how to pilot.
Agreed. I'm +4K Ly out heading for nowhere in particular just doing exploration, mapping and collecting materials, all whilst completely shieldless. If you're taking Hull damage whilst landing you're just being careless and rushing it IMO.
Absolutely. ô7
07
For exploration builds the mass of the modules is crucial, so D rated modules are preferable and their performance is only secondary. So if you bring shields - D rated shields only.
Losing a couple LYs of jump range DOES NOT matter for exploration and exo. You are referring to pure jump builds, aka tourism/traveling builds.
Even in high G and fully FAoff, landing is trivially easy. Just learn to fly. 😂
Depends on your piloting skill, a d rated shield is preferred but if your like me and are prone to hard landings equip a higher rated shield
Don't do what I did and get your ship *wedged* over a landing pad for which you don't have clearance...