Quick Start Guide To Ships
Outdated Content
This page contains content that may be outdated.Please review this article and update it with any needed adjustments to ensure all information is current and accurate.
This page is a candidate for deletion.
Admins will be reviewing the page to see if it needs to be deleted.
The purpose of this guide is to get F2P players to think about their ships from the perspective of a veteran to avoid heartaches that will occur in hindsight. While this guide won’t necessarily cover the fleet arena meta, starter fleets and general advice will be covered. Also, efficient farming won’t be talked about, but the majority of the choices presented will be influenced by this idea. In short, here are a bunch of things you would want to know sooner, rather than later.
Prepping for ZETA Material Farming
One of the major goals in this game is farming Zeta mats. Zeta’s are material you need to take a character’s level-7 skill, to level-8 and make them supremely powerful. This is end game activity that all players work on constantly. To accomplish this, a specific set of ships is required and preparing for zeta farming literally can't start too early.
In order to farm zeta's mats, you need Grand Moff Tarkin’s capital ship, Executrix, at 5-stars; and to get a 5-star Executrix, you need 5 Darkside ships for the tri-weekly, Capital Ship Star Upgrade Event. Finally, to farm zeta's, you need to be level 78, have a 5-star Executrix, and a total of 6, 5-star non-capital ships, (both Lightside and DS are acceptable). The following is the recommended ships and pilot gear levels for the Executrix 5-star event:
Ships: Ship Stars: Pilots: Pilot Stats
1. Executrix 4 stars G M Tarkin: 6-stars, g9
2. TIE Fighter 4~5 stars TIE Ftr Pilot: 6-stars, g9+
3. TIE Silencer 4~5 stars Kylo (unmasked): 6-stars, g9
4. SF’s Geonos’n 4~5 stars Sun Fac: 6-stars, g9
5. TIE Advanced 4~5 stars Darth Vader: 6-stars, g9+
6. Slave 1 4~5 stars Boba Fett: 6-stars, g8
The above list is at the low end of what is needed to get Tarkin's CS upto 5-stars, (which is rather high after Ship 2.0). Ship ability levels should average around 5~6 as well. (NOTE: To achieve the 6-star Executrix, you will need to farm a 6th DS fighter ship.) Add the following LS ships to make 8 total:
7. Biggs X-Wing 5 stars Biggs: 5 stars, g9+
8. Umbaran 5 stars 5555's: 5 stars, g9
At player level 78, Tier-3 of the Ship Ability Materials event will unlock, giving you access to farmable zeta mats. The above list will easily let you 3-star it. There is also a Tier-4 that will open at level 85; 6 non-capital ships at 6-stars and a higher gear level will be needed for that.
Zeta mats can also be bought for 2000 Fleet Tokens (each) in the Fleet Store. Directly buying them means you will rob your fleet arena growth for other areas of the game. Competitive F2P fleet arena players will avoid this option until they are very well established.
Fleet Arena
Most F2P players won’t hit the top 100 (or even 200) in Squad Arena (read the footnote about this blasphemous assertion.) until very late in the game. However, it's far easier to get into the top 20 of Fleet Arena if you laser focus and develop as quickly as you can manage. If your under level 60ish, the ships I outlined above, are not only designed to meet zeta farming goals, but will also get you into the top 20 a very good fighting chance. To speak plainly, the lineup is:
Capital Ship: Executrix
Starters: Biggs, TFP, (Silencer/Fives/Sun Fac)
ReInforcements: Vader as 1st reinforcement (RI), (Fives/Sun Fac/Silencer).
This is NOT a perfect line-up... but it’s pretty close to being one for early Tarkin players. There are pros and cons to this fleet that requires an entire discussion that is beyond the scope of this guide, though some important hints will be touched on in the next section. I’ll just add that a strength of this fleet lies in its ability to achieve early goals and then becoming a solid, versatile backbone as you eventually farm more ships (like the Hound’s Tooth). In other words, all the ships listed above are worth having in the long term. Further information can be found in the SWGoH Imperial Fleet Server Discord.
Fleet Arena Rules of Thumb
[added Dec-8; and preliminary]
- It is currently not efficient, desirable or even possible to begin your arena climb by immediately farming only an "end-game fleet". This is simply not realistic. Winning in fleet arena is about starting with the hand you're dealt and carefully increasing its strength and adding to your roster over time.
- 40% of whether you win or lose in fleet arena comes down to who is more committed to their fleet growth. At the least, keep pace with your enemies.
- Have at least one tank in your starting lineup. In this matter, Biggs’ X-wing is the defining tank in the game... until you can farm Hound's Tooth. Further, it is important to pair Biggs with a ship that can inflict Target Lock (TL). Finally, do not hesitate on his development just because you know he'll get replaced either.
- Your Capital Ship, three starters and 1st RI are simply more important than the rest. While you can’t leave any part of your active fleet in the dust, those 5 should get a little more attention.
- If you decide to use fast ships in your starting lineup, then they should be faster than your enemies at all times. ITF and Silencer are the classic examples.
- The vast majority of starting lineups have the following formulas:
- Tank, Glass Cannon, [Glass Cannon or Support]
- Tank, Tank, [Glass Cannon or Support]
6a. The double cannon is spectacularly viable in premature shards. Their ranking is more volatile but you'll have it a bit easier in climbing back up. Also, you need to make sure at least 1 of the ships goes first in battle, ideally both. This is easy to do in premature shards; pick fast ships and stay on top of their pilots gear grind to keep the speed edge.
6b. The double tank is more stable and more resilient once your shard begins to mature. But, it means you won't have as much firepower up front, so compensating for that in some way becomes a priority as you are more likely to deal with longer battles.
- Multi-pilot ships are like anchors that will absolutely slow your ability to climb to the top of your arena. Even if you are top 20 with them in your fleet, in premature shards, you will eventually be oppressed as your enemies surpass you in strength simply because they are developing fewer pilots for the same amount of ships. Having said that, I have occasionally advised that farming ONE multi-pilot ship is still doable in premature shards. It is a trade-off between slowing your pace to reaching higher reward brackets versus having a fantastic ship ahead of your enemies either for fleet arena or some other goal.
I won’t talk any more about Fleet Arena and other definitely viable teams here. I will just re-affirm that the above list of ships does create a cohesive ship arena team that has allowed at least this author, to maintain a continuous presence at rank #1 (as of 2018-09-06) since Ship 2.0 started in the spring of that year.
Ship Stars and Levels, and Pilots
The default rule of thumb is to level your ship stars and ship levels evenly. This will maximize the amount of stars/levels you get for the least amount of time and in-game credits invested. The Ship Building Materials you earn to star and level-up ships is extremely thin and F2P players do not have the luxury to spend it on whatever they feel like if they intend to be competitive in ship arena and if they want to farm zeta’s as soon as possible.
In other words, there is no real benefit to having one ship at 7 stars and level 65, while all your other ships are 4 stars and level 50. Almost without exception, one ship cannot carry the day for your whole fleet. However, this rule of thumb doesn’t apply to the pilots, as other parts of the game will demand that you farm a character straight to 7 stars as soon as you can.
Finally, in regards to zeta farming, it is recommended (but not crucial) that all your relevant ships get upgraded to 5 stars first, at the expense of getting your pilot's past 4/5 stars (to 6/7 stars) if such farming activities conflict, in order to avoid delaying your own chances to farm zeta mats at level 78.
Ship Stats & Mods
Ship stats (such as Health, Protection, Speed, etc.) are increased by increasing your pilot stars, ship stars, pilot level, ship level, pilot gear, pilot skills and mods. That’s it.
Regarding mods: A mod is something that you can give to a character starting when that toon reaches level 50. A character will receive a variety of stat boosts as listed in the mod itself but, those mod stats as well as the type of mod have absolutely no bearing on ship stats. The only thing that a ship cares about is whether the mod is a 5-dot mod. Thus, as long as you give your pilot's max level 5-dot mods, the ship will gain the maximum benefits to its stats. Once your pilot reaches gear 12, a 5-dot mod can then be “sliced” to a superior 6-dot mod.
Because of this, you can actually use your pilots as a clearinghouse for your mod farming activities. Farm mods regularly, level them up and give them to all your pilots. If a mod with good stats reveals itself, you can then transfer it to a squad arena or raid focused character.
I want to reiterate how important mod farming is before moving on. Complete the Mod Battles to tier-8 to access all the Mod Challenges so you can farm 5-dot mods regularly. Look for mod guides elsewhere for a better understanding of their significance.
Fleet Battles Holotable (PvE)
Initial research has shown that the best use of the PvE Table in general, is to use it to farm gear. The drop rate (as reported thus far in our Discord channel) is roughly 30% per attempt for gear. The Reinforcement Mats appear to drop at a rate of about 10% and Ship Ability Material Omega Mats appear to drop at a rate of 4%. The drop rates for ship and character shards appears identical to the Lightside and Darkside PvE tables.
In terms of character shard or ship shard farming on hard nodes, for new players, it would be best to use the PvE Table to snowball your ship arena squad if the intention is to be competitive. In this regard, the most important farming activity is quite likely acquiring the Reinforcement Materials that can be farmed starting in level 3 normal and hard nodes. RI mats are used to upgrade the unique RI abilities for each ship that they can utilize the one time when it enters battle as a reinforcement. All ships have a level 1 RI ability and a few are useful at that level. Most others need to be maxed to level 3 for a ship to shine in an RI position however. So, do your best to make it to the level 3 PvE battles and farm from that level and up to maximize your farming efficiency. Please do note that the 3 ships at the start of your battle will not utilize their RI abilities as they are not reinforcements.
Farming matters of note
Boba Fett, Vader, Sun Fac and Darth Maul
Slave 1 and TIE Advanced are top rated ships that can be acquired in the Ship Arena Shop but don't drop very often. While the introduction of the Fleet PvE table has made these two ships farmable (hard nodes 2-B, 4-B), players are strongly recommended to always hold back 800 ship tokens to buy these shards whenever they show up in the store. Even so, the drop rate is slow enough to very likely delay your ability to farm zeta's until your level 80 something (if you’re to follow the DS ship recommendations above). Thus, it’s also recommended that a small amount of node farming be included, perhaps 50 - 80 shards worth, to increase your chance of being ready by level 78.
Sun Fac and Darth Maul are also somewhat slower farms as the pilot shards are rarer drops in Fleet Arena Store [and Guild Store (Darth Maul only)]. Their ships are also rarer drops in the Fleet Arena Store [and Galactic War Store (Sun Fac’s ship only)], but can also be farmed in the ship PvE table (hard nodes 2-A, 3-D). Do not think to farm these characters and ships too casually if you plan to acquire them. More significantly, farming these toons+ships can put quite a bit of pressure on your Fleet Arena credits since both pilots and ships are largely farmed out of that store. It is strongly recommended that early players only choose one to farm and leave the other for later.
Galactic War Store and Fleet Arena Store
Galactic War Store: Too many good targets and not enough tokens is the theme in this store. Outside of what you decide to farm for the Scoundrel Credit-Heist events and Squad Arena, the only sure fire targets are your targeted ship shards and their pilots.
Fleet Arena Store: Too many targets and not enough tokens is again, the theme in this store. Because getting top 20 in Fleet Arena IS realistic for F2P players, you will want to spend your tokens here snowballing ONLY your fleet arena team.
Contraband Cargo Event
[preliminary]
The Contraband Cargo Event
A few notes on Deadly Tier (final tier):
- Completion of the Deadly Tier is possible with just 4 cargo ships semi-consistently.
- Successful runs show cargo ships with g9-g12 pilots. (g11 is the average).
- Successful use of Home One, Chimaera, Executrix leads have been reported.
- Home One appears to have it a bit easier. Executrix appears to have it a bit harder.
- Slave 1 off the bench with max RI appears to be popular.
- Hound’s Tooth, as the only eligible tank, will make the event easier. However, newer players are cautioned not to wait to complete the Contraband Event by waiting to develop this ship.
…and that’s it for this guide. Visit our discord and you can go much much deeper down the rabbit hole. Welcome to the world of ships!
Credits
Author: Kamu Teel
Editor and Contributor: Andrakisji
Additional Contributors: Acrofales, horsetronaut, Enka Vole, DBlade21, CoreyeroC, AlanSkywalker, Taliana, un2sm, bmg_dan, AltaïrKyle42, Rastigi, jraenar, Moj, Zungate
Imperial Fleet Server Discord channel: https://discord.gg/shQjmUc
