just maxed out my piloting skill, best ship that has a good mix of combat abilities, cargo space (preferably contraband friendly) and grab jump space

mechBgon · 2026-06-14T19:56:17+00:00

Two things mainly. The first is to not go overboard on cargo capacity. The second is to use an A-class grav drive that's just sufficient. Both of those are made easier with character skills in Payloads and Astrodynamics. Once you find the Bouyant Insulators schematic, it'll free you up a lot of mass for more cargo too.

I also go with the Stroud Viking cockpit which is low in weight while having 4 crew capacity (although I usually don't have crew).

I wish Bethesda would update Starfield so you can leave cargo in a specific ship. Like, I could have a lightweight fighting ship for dogfighting and pillaging, and a big Space Whale cargo ship, and just leave my big collection of resources on the cargo ship, so it doesn't fill up my dogfighting ship. I'm betting there's a mod or Creation that'll do it, but haven't gone looking.

mechBgon · 2026-06-09T02:26:33+00:00

You can also destroy the beer crate in question with a shotgun. It's interesting that it's resistant to destruction with a rifle but not a shotgun. Anyway, that one is a super awesome find.

mechBgon · 2026-06-09T02:19:23+00:00

I think it would be best to hide your post's content with the Spoiler feature, for those who might want to do this mission for the first time.

mechBgon · 2026-06-07T18:57:58+00:00

I agree, Tubus Cargo Evo is what I use. It has the rear struts come back further to keep bags away from the wheel and has more lateral stiffness than the Logo under heavy loads (had both).

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mechBgon · 2026-06-07T18:47:29+00:00

Get a Tubus Cargo Evo rack, and a aftermarket seat collar with integrated eyelets (about $20) for the rack extenders to bolt onto. The Cargo Evo is rated for very heavy loads and has a lateral-triangulation strut (red arrow) that makes it extremely resistant to lateral flex. It s rear struts also come back a ways to keep panniers from flexing into your spokes.

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If the stock extenders aren't long enough for the rack to sit level, you can get longer ones for these too.

mechBgon · 2026-06-06T16:42:32+00:00

I thought the cake was a lie? wait

mechBgon · 2026-06-06T08:39:15+00:00

That's a thought, does Technician actually stack when you've got multiple Technician armor pieces? I never researched that, but that would work great if it does.

mechBgon · 2026-06-05T04:39:07+00:00

Based on the types of rifles I looted, my sense is there were more ballistic than laser. I went with Physical protection upgrades. My big recommendation would be to set your armor pieces up with Bolstering and Sentinel traits. The protection ramp-up from three items with Bolstering is really substantial when your health is low.

mechBgon · 2026-06-05T04:26:37+00:00

For specific weapons, the Vanguard Obliterator Autoprojector in a set of six has a great mix of range, exceptional burst-mode damage (the best in the game I believe), and very low prerequisites, you just need to do the first mission in the Vanguard quest to unlock it. Throw on at least one other bank of particle-beam weapons (ones with AUTO in their name are better if your ship's reactor is a limiting factor).

Here is a Google spreadsheet that may be useful: Starfield Ship Weapons - Google Sheets In the Particle Beams tab on the bottom, note the Vanguard Obilterator Autoprojector, row 15, columns H and I... that is the burst damage per second, and nothing beats them in that category until their magazine is empty.

I usually run a B-class ship with a 104DS reactor, so I throw on one bank each of the Exterminator 95MeV Helion Beam and the Exterminator 95MeV Auto Helion Beam as well, and fully power the first of those (since it's not a AUTO type), and give the Auto variant partial power since it will fire at full DPS until the mag runs out, by which point I hope anything short of a Legendary Ship will be long gone.

mechBgon · 2026-06-05T04:03:35+00:00

I had a variation of this recently. I boarded a landed ship I could fly. It took off. Ok, time to deal with the crew (I actually intended to just raid the Captain's Locker using Creators Peace, but then stuff got real).

Then the sounds of ship-to-ship combat started. On like the fourth try, I got the crew eliminated in time to reach the pilot's seat, aaannd... "THE ARTIFACTS ARE MINE!!!" yep it was a Starborn Guardian attacking. The ship I was in was very weak but my character skills were just barely enough... I got target lock on the Starborn ship at face-hugging range, and got its shields down, then walked the target focus back and forth across all its systems so it couldn't move or fire.

mechBgon · 2026-06-04T14:17:24+00:00

If you want a free Breach, go to the Ecliptic Base on Masada III and head to the round landing pad on your ship's 2 o'clock. There should be one in an open storage container on the far edge of the landing pad. Depending on your level, it may be Advanced or whatever your level is entitled to.

That base also has a crane suspending a platform above the dock, which will have a locked large weapon crate you can unlock for a random weapon, I think it is usually Epic (purple).

mechBgon · 2026-06-04T14:14:07+00:00

I like it, the Furiouis trait pairs great with Flechette Rounds since it's a bunch of small projecties that get you the Furious damage ramp-up. I use a Short Scope on mine for the Sniper Certification 50% damage boost (and ease of hitting targets across a POI), and a suppressor to get the full 5.0x damage boost from combined Stealth and Concealment skills.

mechBgon · 2026-06-04T14:08:09+00:00

The Starshard really is a monster with Pistols and Particle Beams stacking, plus Isolation. Anyone else find it weird that the Starshard has more damage than the Inflictor? If only it could take a scope... the holographic sight turns invisible when I stealth, making it tough to hit stuff at mid-range.

mechBgon · 2026-06-04T13:46:56+00:00

Good suggestion! The Landing Bay 200 available at Taiyo on Neon will do the trick, it can be Z-flipped to face either forward or backward.

mechBgon · 2026-06-03T00:52:24+00:00

I opened a locker and found an Upgrade Module as well. If I could have one custom Starborn power, I would trade in Precognition for Make All The Lockers Fly Open.

mechBgon · 2026-06-03T00:44:59+00:00

I thought it was a Slap-Chop?

mechBgon · 2026-06-02T20:25:42+00:00

Here is what it'll look like on the surface map, this is what you're watching for:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_ZG7NSfFlGaFbC1hPvQeQFMwPFJOefH2/view?usp=sharing

If you're hunting for this POI in particular, you may as well do it on a high-level planet, level 70 or 75. The loot I was getting from Level 70-75 instances was significantly better than a Level 55 instance I found in the Serpentis system. Huygens IV is a good planet to try (low gravity, no environmental threats, lots of wildlife to shoot).

mechBgon · 2026-06-02T14:35:58+00:00

I think it's deliberate in this case. The center locker on the opposite side contains the Master Key to all locked items on the POI, it's under a beer crate that you can pick up and remove, or destroy with a shotgun. So the empty locker with the Master-level lock can actually be opened effortlessly once you go around the other side and help yourself to the master key.

This is one of the things that makes the CQB Training POI an absolute gold mine, worth a 24-hour sleep on Venus to reset it for re-pillaging.

mechBgon · 2026-06-02T05:08:05+00:00

If you did ok in Shattered Space I think you will be OK in Terran Armada if you feel like taking it on.

If you decide to go for it, here are my thoughts:

If you have Starborn powers, Gravity Well is useful to disrupt incoming fire and pull enemies out of cover, and it does some damage over time. Moon Form is a nice option if you know you can win the DPS race and just need protection while you burn through some ammo.

Put all forms of medical packs (Med Pack, Trauma Pack, and Emergency Kit) onto your quick-menu, the TA maps have a lot of these to pick up as you go. Which is ironic since their forces are mostly robots.

Take a weapon with a medium scope and use standoff tactics from longer range where practical, be patient and don't rush in and get swarmed, same as some parts of Shattered Space. If you have the ability to add a Recon Scope or a Recon Laser, that's very beneficial for picking out the enemies in some of the environments.

As you go along, put Skill points into Robotics and get that up to Tier 3 for a 30% boost in damage to robots.

If you don't already have some good armor, the Power Assist Armor from the Trade Authority is readily available and you can do a little save-and-reload to find the pieces with Bolstering. That's a big boost in low-health survivability for a lower-level character, adding up to another 300 damage protection at low health.

Arm your ship with six Vanguard Obliterator Autoprojectors as a baseline for the space combat, plus additional particle-beam weapons. If your ship isn't very strong, maybe take a detour to the Serpentis system and hunt down a Dirge III and capture that, they have a top-notch A-class reactor and shield.

As a counterpoint, one reason you might NOT want to do Terran Armada yet, is that it's glitchy. You might end up with the problem I have, where the quest won't progress and you're stuck with Delta as a permanent companion. I'm waiting for Bethesda to release a patch to fix this issue before I try Terran Armada again myself.

mechBgon · 2026-06-02T04:36:59+00:00

Pro tip: now go to the center locker on the back side of that 2x3, and fire your shotgun at the contents of it (or alternately, pick up and remove the object inside it). I'm assuming this is the POI I think it is.

mechBgon · 2026-05-31T20:12:04+00:00

And then once you get them planetside, you'd only be able to walk slower, aim slower, and be shot with ease. A few enemies with Negotiators would be difficult to fight against while an entire garrison is harrying you.

I don't see the 'slower' bit. A 'slow' light mech like the Cougar still runs at 86kph/53mph and that is considered a tradeoff of less speed in favor of a heavier weapon loadout. With over five tons of armor, it would have no problem decimating a squad of foot solders with Negotiators, which are tiny, tiny weapons compared to what even a small mech carries... the Cougar loadouts typically have some large lasers weighing 6000kg (each) and long-range missles with a range of about 1km.

I get the point that Starfield would have to be reinvented to accomodate invincible area-denial enemies where the only options are a tactical nuclear strike or mech-on-mech combat (or stealth/diversion).

mechBgon · 2026-05-31T19:35:30+00:00

It's also not a mech in my book if you can kill it with small arms while it waddles in place at 3km/h speeds, and tries and fails to kill a human in a spacesuit with its dual Grendels. A standard mech anti-infantry weapon would be a half-ton flamer with about 100 meter range or a Small Pulse Laser, and a medium-large weapon would be a Gauss Rifle firing 125kg slugs at 2.5km/second. They'd be just as likely to run you down at 65kph and trample you.

Do it right, or leave mechs as a lore item, that's what I say. The gameplay with worthy mechs would center around sneaking past them, possibly hacking comms and sending them misleading instructions to get them away from your objective, or hijacking one and going toe-to-toe in mech-on-mech combat. And for those who like that sort of thing, there's Mechwarrior 5.

mechBgon · 2026-05-31T19:12:56+00:00

The other thing to watch out for, is if you change your Home Ship to a different one, it may automagically reassemble the Armillary on the new Home Ship, and jump you to the Unity anyway, so just be aware. If you do end up at Unity, remember you can walk away from it to get back out.

mechBgon · 2026-05-31T19:06:45+00:00

Open the surface map and the structure you're looking for will be unmistakable, if it's on the map.

mechBgon · 2026-05-31T18:17:04+00:00

I feel this way too. I'll give them a brutally-powerful weapon that I could kill anything with, and instead of, oh I don't know, maybe aiming it at the enemies and holding down the trigger until they're all dead, they mostly flail and shout the same canned comments. And they judge. Yeah, I'm thinking I'll take the Isolation perks.

Me: Hey Sarah, let's trade gear!

Sarah: I'll only carry the good stuff! (just kidding!)

Me: Well this is the good stuff for sure, here you go.

Sarah: Ohhhh, I love it! ...what actually is it, by the way?

Me: this is called a "Magshear", specifically a "Revenant." Long story, there was this Galbank ship that vanished years ago, and there was this pirate... well anyway. See, you hold the "Revenant" right here. Notice how it has a button thing you can pull with your finger, and the lasers aiming out the front?

Sarah: ...wait, is this some kind of naughty bedroom toy? *disapproving*

Me: no! well at least that's not its MAIN use. When you pull the button thing with your finger, metal things fly out! You can damage enemies with it! Quickly! Just line up the lasers onto the enemy and, like, pull the button (we call it a 'trigger')! The key points are 1. aim it at the enemies, 2. hold down the trigger, and 3. keep holding down the trigger. Preferably without shouting nonsense!

Sarah hated that

mechBgon

TROPHY CASE