I'm level 30-ish and have played for 91 hours.
I spent a good chunk of that messing with ships until I finally got the design I want, at least from this profile. The ass needs improvement and I want to hide some of the stuff like fuel. I just need to level up some skills so I can carry more mass, install better engines/reactors/shields etc...
I love the EM weapons on the front, look like headlights. The 4 electron (forget actual name) weapons on the outside eviscerate every shield, while the missiles, along with the electron weapons, take out the hull. I get enemy ships down to super low health before using the EM guns to disable engines for boarding. I'm in the CF, but I can attack CF ships and board them after disabling engines. So long as I don't kill anyone on board, I can loot at will as they still see me as their ally. If I destroy their ship, only then will I get a bounty on my head, must be a bug.
The FS-Defiance (inspired by Star Trek's Defiant). This was the Razorleaf. It's still identified as the Razorleaf in random events by Pirates.
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On top of letting you do a walkthrough of the compartments, they really need to let you save your edits as a temp blueprint. Shit can get bananas, takes me back to my lego days.
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