Outfitting Utilities
Successful Bounty Hunting in Elite Dangerous
As a bounty hunter in Elite: Dangerous, your first priority should be weapons right? Well sorry to say this but you’re only half correct. Weapon choice is incredibly important but the other components you slot into your ship can make or break your crook-chasing ways.
Utility Mounts are a difficult set of points to get geared correctly. As a bounty hunter, this is mostly up to you and your personal preferences. However, using two in particular is always a good idea for chasing down the big targets.
A Frame Shift Drive Interdictor will allow you to pull those who you’re hunting out of Supercruise and get you into combat with them without having to hang around at Navigation Beacons or in an asteroid field. It takes no more than a few seconds to scan another ship in Elite: Dangerous. Should they flash up as Wanted, you don’t want them slipping away do you?
Pairing this with a Frame Shift Wake Scanner is never a bad idea. When a ship jumps to Supercruise or even to another system in Elite: Dangerous, it will leave a small Frame Shift Wake.
These come in Low and High Energy types. A Low Energy Wake can be scanned by any ship but the big, juicy prizes will almost exclusively leave behind a High Energy Wake. Target the wake then activate your Frame Shift Wake Scanner and you’ll be able to jump right up behind the escaping enemy.
Small fry like Adders or Cobra’s are unlikely to leave these, but the Asps and Lakon Type-7s which often have high bounties attached to them can jump away from combat. Use this to chase them down and blow them into tiny pieces.
A Kill Warrant Scanner is often a good idea too as a ship with a bounty in one system may also have a bounty value on their head from somewhere else. Double the money for the same amount of work, if you don’t mind flying to other systems.
As far as the rest are concerned, it’s pretty much up to you when it comes to Utility Mounts. A Chaff Launcher or Point Defense Turret might buy you a few seconds of free combat but you’re a bounty hunter. Your focus should be targeted purely at chasing down and destroying your targets as quickly as possible, not concerning yourself with staying alive.
That aside, whacking some high quality armor plating and a Shield Generator onto your chosen vehicle of death is pretty much mandatory. A powerful Shield Generator will not only keep you alive, it will cut down those irritating repair overheads and allow you make even more cash for every ne’er-do-well you leave smoking in the ruins of their own petard.
A high quality Shield Generator allows you to shrug off any small arms fire from the smaller craft while providing vital breathing room when facing ships larger than yourself. It’ll also help on that rare occasion when your target outmaneuver’s you and they can get in a few lucky shots.
A powerful Frame Shift Drive and a good set of Thrusters rarely goes amiss when bounty hunting in Elite: Dangerous, same really for a Cargo hold that can be used to scoop up and carry whatever your unfortunate foe may leave behind.
Over all of these though, you should really invest into the best Power Distribution System that you can afford for your chosen craft. These will enable you to charge systems quicker which means only one thing – more laser fire to pump into enemies.
Of course, it also means that you can recharge shields much quicker and your engines should a quick getaway be necessary. Keeping those weapon batteries filled up to fire is your primary concern however, one that should always be heavily monitored.
Okay now we can dig out that subscription to the Milky Way Rifle Association and talk guns.
