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[Igncom1]

Range is great until it stops mattering as the remnants close into knife fighting range anyway.

[TaLaR]

Skill-less player build (because I don't have one to outfit in current campaign):

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Extra OP from ordnance expertise should go into maxing vents to 60 and replacing Arbalests with either HAC or Heavy Needlers. It's kind of awkward to use without a skilled character, but still barely good enough to defeat pretty much any ship in skill-less sim combat when player piloted (close range side doesn't see much use without skills and is pretty much dead OP for sim duels).

One side to snipe, other to finish off heavy armor or fend off frigates while you are busy sniping.

IPDAI IR Pulse needs a lot to actually work: Augmented Gyros to be able to track, Gunnery Implants/Advanced Countermeasures for proper missile leading +range +damage to safely intercept Sabots/Squalls, all the efficiency boosts to not simply overflux with them... But once you get all skills, it's the best PD + anti-fighter + close combat setup.

Accelerated shields since it's a very flux-hot setup and you want to vent/drop shield at every single opportunity. Without this hullmod shields are just not raised quickly enough to reactively block incoming shots.

EDIT: Close range side is wrong. It should be either Storm Needler + Hellbore + (medium kinetics) + dual flak/medium kinetics to optimize against vulnerable large ships OR MarkIX + Mjolnir + (medium kinetics) + H Mauler to optimize frigate/DE swatting.

[intrinsic_parity]

I like storm needler conquest vs remnants as a player ship. Usually I pair it with HAG and another kinetic in the medium slot along with dual flak (and flak/ 1 or 2 devastators and a medium kinetic on the backside). The conquest definitely needs hardened shields and a decent amount of caps to make the storm needler work properly, but 1500 dps vs shields is very valuable, especially against powerful shields.

I also like locusts in the missile slots as finishers. They let you finish without committing too far into the enemy fleet and add quite a bit of hull dps.

Storm needler on dominator is actually not too bad, but only with an officer that boosts flux stats and damage and stuff (and also with annihilators). I never use the onslaught but I bet it would have a similar effect with an officer there.

[Megas]

Range is great until it stops mattering as the remnants close into knife fighting range anyway.

Until they decide to be stinking cowards after they lose the flux war and try to escape.  Range is handy if it means they take more damage as they back off.  (Part of the reason why I want HIL or lances in some mounts on Paragon.)

Conquest is so-so against Remnants.  Has problems if it gets pinched.

[Plantissue]

EDIT: You really don't need Extended or any other shields mods except for Hardened. That's only so you can survive a salvo of missiles or shots. You should never be taking all enemy fire with it. Your speed is the key, get away from anything coming at you that's bigger than a cruiser and kite them till they die.

Hardened Shield only helps if the shot hits the shield in the first place. It is always better to take hits on a shield than on armour/hull. Those shield mods are so that you are more likely to take hits on the shield as opposed the the armour/hull itself. Conquest has one of the smallest shield arcs. I can't think of any ship that has the same or small shield arc, especially for so big a ship. For instance, the conquest has difficulty in shielding against Hurricane MIRV.

[Grievous69]

EDIT: You really don't need Extended or any other shields mods except for Hardened. That's only so you can survive a salvo of missiles or shots. You should never be taking all enemy fire with it. Your speed is the key, get away from anything coming at you that's bigger than a cruiser and kite them till they die.

Hardened Shield only helps if the shot hits the shield in the first place. It is always better to take hits on a shield than on armour/hull. Those shield mods are so that you are more likely to take hits on the shield as opposed the the armour/hull itself. Conquest has one of the smallest shield arcs. I can't think of any ship that has the same or small shield arc, especially for so big a ship. For instance, the conquest has difficulty in shielding against Hurricane MIRV.

Well duuh that's why I said it's played like a sniper. If you're getting surrounded in it you're doing something wrong. Why waste precious OP just to get a 150 degree shield, which will still suck? It's better to avoid hits altogether. As for Hurricane MIRVs, you have a mobility system, use it smart. You should never be in a position where you have to take so many missile shots on either shield or armor.

[Plantissue]

You are not going to outrange a Hurricane MIRV with your Gauss Cannons on a Conquest, mods excepting.

The point of Extended Shield or Accelerated shields is to take hits that would otherwise be on armour/hull. Muffalo's choice to take Extended Shield is reasonable. If during the course of play, he feels that he doesn't need the extra coverage, he will take it away anyways. If you can just avoid all hits, then Hardened Shield would be useless anyways, so that too would be a waste of precious OP.


Anyways, since Talar posted his interesting IPDAI IR Pulse Conquest build, here is mine.

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I tend to bounce between ships so I don't have it as a flagship and it is normally officered but I will transfer when neccessary, so it's a bit of a compromise between different needs of personally pilot and AI-controlled. It's a kind of "do-it-all" ship. Vents enough to fire one side + all PD and beams. One of the Conquests had the Capacitors was at 18 OP for 23600 Flux Capacity and Vents at 60 for 1800 Dissipation, so at some point I must have changed the capacitors/vents but didn't for that one for some reason. It's not completely optimal in some areas. For instance if I was personally piloting I would probably try to stick an Ion beam on instead and try to change weapons to make a weapon group for them. Armored Weapon Mounts is probably the most unusual choice that other people don't choose.

Weapon groups. Conquest is a good example of a ship where you would wish you have more than 5 weapon groups available. I've always wondered how other people weapon group their Conquest.

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[Grievous69]

Welp since others have posted nudes guess I should do the same:

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I'm not in super late game so I still have Efficiency Overhaul on most ships where I can squeeze it.

For me 5 groups are just enough for Conquest, tho I could see some builds having problems.

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[Igncom1]

Here is mine for AI piloting:

https://imgur.com/a/fKW0kb1

I just click auto three times for the weapon groups, just to be sure.

It does utterly all right in battle. It won't be winning any major prizes for performance but it can tear through the shields and armour of anything smaller then it while having a shy chance in hell of surviving an encounter with anything bigger then it.

[Goumindong]

There are a couple of different ways to set up the conquest. A strange one that I kinda like is

2x Hammer Barrage
2x Heavy Blasters
2x Sabot Pods

PD in the medium sides
Burst PD in the small rear
Burst PD in the front (sometimes)

ITU, ECCM, Expanded Missile Racks, Hardened Shields

The HB are good enough to pick off small ships on their own and they plus the hammers will make short work of cruisers or above. It won't brawl with Onslaughts but it will finish an onslaught faster than an onslaught will.

[Megas]

I have used IPDAI IR Pulse Lasers on Conquest when I have not yet found enough burst PD to use.  Gets the job done.

[muffalo]

Thanks for advice everyone! I ended up with an asymmetrical design with Hurricane MIRV-s and have AI pilot it because without being able to configure "hold shift" to point at its broadside, flying it is an exercise in frustration. AI is surprisingly good - it seems to get the "asymmetrical design" thing. The only complaint, which is not Conquest-specific, is how AI tends to fire all rockets and vaporize the first random shuttle it stumbles upon. Also going over your designs made me realize that my understanding of flux vents has been wrong and I ended up revising my entire fleet (I thought vents mattered only when you vent via "v"). Also I must say that the diversity of these designs and that battlecruiser needs all this work instead of just being an unkillable tank is a testament to the incredible depth of Starsector combat.

[Megas]

If I want to use missiles on Conquest, I use Locusts and Expanded Missiles Racks because they last the longest (aside from Salamanders and Pilums) and are good against just about anything.  However, for the long-range loadouts with Gauss, Locusts may not have enough range, and MIRVs may need to be used instead.

[SCC]

Here's my flagship fit for a Conquest. I don't tend to give Conquests to AI, but if I have to, I go with some symmetrical loadouts. Whatever I have available at the time.
This particular build is meant to pound things into submission from afar or on favourable terms. I rely on shields, mainly because I active-vent often, and shields are better for that. There are probably better builds designed for either, but this one is still reliable enough for me.

Thanks for advice everyone! I ended up with an asymmetrical design with Hurricane MIRV-s and have AI pilot it because without being able to configure "hold shift" to point at its broadside, flying it is an exercise in frustration.

Firstly, you can reverse hold shift behaviour in the settings, so that you don't have to hold shift all the time. Especially since you don't know how to fly using tank controls.
Secondly, you can't really fly a Conquest without using tank controls, because you need to control its shield, and this means you have to manoeuvre without using mouse for that. Conquest is a broadside ship and pointing it front towards the enemy is really counterproductive.

[TaLaR]

Yeah, to optimally pilot the Conquest and Odyssey you really want to use all 3 axis manually at the same time (forward-backward, rotation, strafe). Which not every keyboard will actually support ( check for key ghosting https://drakeirving.github.io/MultiKeyDisplay/ )