hi all
i have been reading around the forums about an energy build ship but not much info on how people go about it in terms of

when the switch to all engineers

how they aquire decks

what ship research they have while staying small ship size but high rank etc etc

if anyone could shed some more light on this it would be appreciated

thanks

It's not that you don't get decks, you just don't take as many per level. I think I did all engineers for a while when I started, then switched to three engineers and two decks per level. Even though you get less per level, you level up much faster so it balances out. Research should focus on planetary structures and energy, at least when you're starting.

its my understanding that an energy built ship has 3 of the best reactors and the max amount of conduits fitted so it is able to do missions much easier than pvp/pve.
ie its a style of play choice rather than a way of life like the small ship build...if you have the credits you can switch to a more weapon oriented build quite easily(needs a lot of storage to be truly viable)
engineers come in at the very top couple of core research lvls...law of diminishing returns vs cost

The dynamic has changed since RSL implants became rare. Having enough energy could rank up multiple times, but the threshold for doing so without RSL is higher; this is also considering Inergon energy boost. Still, Inergon with higher generator tech and most points into engineers will rank faster. I did all decks like most people recommend, until I had about 500 decks, then I realized the charge time to rank was becoming unacceptable and started putting all points into engineers. 500 decks is enough to unlock most missions if you swap modules specifically for that purpose (requires enough cargo to do so).

You will not have room for defenses for a long time if you max weapons (I still don't at rank 960, only npc modules, not tech modules except shields). You will need to swap out stuff for your energy modules when you rank up, so don't go expensive techs until you can afford not to take them off. I put all rank points from prisoners and ranks into engineers, so the main source of decks is from ship bots (for example I got 4 this morning).

and as an energy build, artifact production is more important than research or miining put together, as this is how you aquire the sufficient amount of ship bots and prisoners to be able to do this.

Well having about half the tech tree early helps maximize the use of decks without extreme cost. Minerals was the last thing I focused on unless I needed more for upkeep, I mainly used NPC modules since they are cheap to swap out and repair. Now, theracrons and supernova generators are the only thing that I don't touch due to repair costs. The Sha'din chain required some effort and cost to quality for the mission, but by that point you are setup anyway, the cost isn't so bad if you are efficient with modules. I don't run any scan/cloak and I'm about half defense, that's the cost of the build and you won't pvp so well, but I've got more planet slots than I can possibly afford and a massive credit bonus on daily reward, so rank for rank's sake does have a coupler perks; the rest is just how high your AP is and how fast the bots and prisoners add up.

thanks for the replys guys, ill be looking at this alot more in the next few weeks, as now its too slow to level up at the moment and i feel like i have got alot of catching up to do with top players.

tech wise i dont run scan or cloak anyways, i have h.antiprotons and will stay there, i have my 5 hulls at the deep core neutron armour, after that im looking at starting the supernova enrgy tech.

looks like i need artifact planets and good luck witht the artifact pulls.

What level are you, boomsly? I was assuming you were lower level, but it seems not.

im 229 now with about 1400 decks, i have a half decent research income but the rest is a little behind i think

That's plenty. I am able to finish every mission with less than 1500 decks. If you get more generators and NPC modules that boost energy, and focus on engineers you will notice less time between ranks. You're also in a position to NPC quickly to rank up if your weapons are good enough.

sounds like a plan then, ill research up the energy tree as fast as i can manage and start dumping points into engineers,

if i follow the rough rule of rank x 10 for energy needed to level at a rate of X4 xp ill be good?

You're thinking right, but the numbers are a bit off. Each rank is +40 XP needed, the energy needed depends on the XP ratio of the activity. NPC hunting is highly variable but if you're setup right can be 3.0+ ratio, for missions depends on the mission, but with neural interfaces 2.7 ratio is sustainable with no special tricks on repeatable missions; non-repeatable missions vary from 1.7 to 2.4-2.6 base ratio, so you have to divide 40 XP by the ratio you expect to get. For me, 13.6 energy/rank is the golden ratio for a specialized RSL purging run, but note this is very difficult to do for most people. Focusing on NPC may be your best bet, and throw in some missions if you can rank off it.

ah that makes sense the lack of rsl implants makes this a little bit trickier to do but can still be possible with a bit of thought, cheers for the help binary man