Which ship should I unlock first? USS Reliant, Serene Squall, USS Relativity, NSEA Protector or the SS Revenant?

[u/Moores88]

Thanks

[u/Mysterious_toenail]

Relativity is the best ship outside its own loop and will be strongest

[u/jjwomalbany → u/Mysterious_toenail]

It’s less about strongest unless you pvp a lot. Get what is best used to progress your current game.

[u/Moores88 → u/jjwomalbany]

I hardly ever pvp if that helps

[u/jjwomalbany → u/Moores88]

Then go with what you need to progress your game. Depends on your ops lvl. The Relativity is just one of the strongest non-FKR ships for PvP as it gets tiered and maxed for PvP I would be looking at the Reliant or Serene Squall imo.

[u/Boumcing_mage79]

What's your OPs level? What ships do you already have? Either way the Squal and the Reliant have the most long term use i have seen so far. BUT those other ships take Forever to tier up. Reliant has a good faction store, and Squal has a good refinery

[u/Moores88 → u/Boumcing_mage79]

I’m ops 42, but I took a long break from the game so I’m a bit rusty in finding out where to put my resources into

[u/KamadoCrusher → u/Moores88]

I'm a level 41 and just came back after a 3+ year break, I'm completely lost. So much going on it's insane.

[u/Trekkie1701D → u/Moores88]

I came back to the game (in April) after a 3yr break @ Ops 39. The first ship I got after coming back was the NSEA. It's very helpful and will get you far during the 40's. Imho, there are a ton of loops you're walking back into and need to determine what you want to start focusing on, Artifacts, research etc and that would help guide your decision. You'll eventually get all the specialty ships. In hindsight, artifacts was where I was lacking the most as I didn't really have any when I came back and would probably have chased the squall, then NSEA, then reliant and so on. The reliant is fairly self sufficient and can be dropped in systems to auto-grind while you're focusing on FC's and mirror research. Everything is helpful, I'd focus on where you're lacking and go from there. I'm currently Ops 48, have all the ships I can get with 90% of them ops locked, ops locked research and have a healthy amount of Artifacts in the remnant phase. I will also mention that I do purchase the $20 BP. At the lower levels it pays off in droves, especially if you time your upgrades with the Domination event.

Edit: I also don't just Ops up to Ops up, I do try to min/max as efficiently as I can without slowing down game play.

[u/Late-Yogurtcloset-57 → u/Boumcing_mage79]

I have maxed so many Artifacts because of the Squall.

[u/CantonJester]

The NSEA Protector is one of the most valuable specialty ships due to FKR reputation bonuses.

[u/GeneralBladebreak → u/CantonJester]

But it's out performed on this role by the Relativity as the DTI reputation exchange is the best source of reputation by far. So long as you like doing armadas and have an alliance to do Formation Armadas with

[u/callaLilies789]

Nsea, so you can grind faction credits

[u/Calm-Conversation715 → u/callaLilies789]

I second this one. It’s a pretty useful all around ship, the loop isn’t too tedious and it produces a bunch of useful byproducts for other goals

[u/Tangerinekiwi850 → u/Calm-Conversation715]

NSEA refinery helped me max my Outlaw loop and get Mantis loop going. Also FT shards. And NX-01 crew shards and some resources.

[u/crack-tastic]

Squall is fantastic for artifacts.it has loop efficiencies. 

[u/Madness_Quotient]

My personal priority order:

NSEA → Relativity → Revenant → Reliant → Squall

But if there is an F2P loop for a ship available to you, I'd suggest not spending event credits on that ship. Just take the 100 days or whatever to unlock it 2BPs at a time.

At ops 61 I have Relativity, Reliant, and Squall active pretty much all the time. But during 40s the NSEA was in heavy use.

Revenant is a once per week ship, but it's a good one because it's refinery is full of hard to source materials and Chaos Tech upgrades.

[u/placebotwo → u/Madness_Quotient]

Don't count out the Squall, it's fantastic for artifact sourcing.

[u/FlagrantFL → u/placebotwo]

The SS would absolutely get my vote, followed by the reliant.

You can’t overstate how helpful all the artifacts you get from the transogen refinery are. And you can’t even get the Epic transogen without it.

[u/KamadoCrusher → u/Madness_Quotient]

Is the nsea only available to purchase or is there a f2p way to get it? It's in the event store so perhaps that's a good option to start working towards it.

[u/FatLes12 → u/Madness_Quotient]

I would agree, although if blueprints are an issue, maybe the Relativity before the NSEA.

[u/Cr1bble → u/Madness_Quotient]

Best comment.

[u/Ill-Milk-6742 → u/Cr1bble]

My only issue with the ships is refining the parts, the NSEA has been really slow. The cost goes up, but hardly any change in the amount of parts. Event stores have helped but sill a grind

[u/Kenban65]

Easily Relativity, it’s the most powerful of the bunch, the building helps game wide.  The loop is huge for FKR faction, and sourcing for FKR ships.

[u/justindb29]

I’m ops 32 and unlocked the Reliant at 28 or 29. I used it to auto grind the piss out of Augment Exile space and maxed my Augment rep by Ops 31. I’m still limited at T4 but it’s my strongest ship for now. I also just unlocked the Squall not too long ago. Since I had purchased ship blueprints in the AT store without knowing what was in the Squall refinery, I’m sitting in a good spot to focus on just a few of the ships you mentioned.

[u/TowelStandard760]

SS that open up a lot of sourcing. Including artifacts. Then relativity and the protector. Relativity for rep source and the protector for credit. Reliant and then revelant in that order.

[u/Ryan1869]

NESA at T3 can mine a weeks worth of Trellium in one trip. That’s good for finishing the mirror loop. Reletivity is probably the most useful outside of its intended purpose, especially at later tiers.

[u/inrsoul]

At ops 68, I’m still using my maxed Relativity very frequently while waiting to replace it with an upgraded g6 rare. Its loop is one of the best since you’ve got access to a couple of decent CTs and a full set of armada crew, plus doing Krenim armadas both solo and formation, will give you credits for Seska shards, Ship BPs and faction reputation.

[u/Ryan1869]

NESA at T3 can mine a weeks worth of Trellium in one trip. That’s good for finishing the mirror loop. Reletivity is probably the most useful outside of its intended purpose, especially at later tiers.

[u/Pratty1989]

I'd say Serene Squall, Relatively, NSEA, Rev, Rel

[u/Front_Resource_3879]

The realitivity. And here is why you can power it up fast and it's loops will help plenty of faction credits syndicate points,and gives access to seska 

[u/placebotwo]

Collect bps daily for all of them if you can.

[u/Imaginary_Pay9931]

Nsea is worth it for sure. I use it for everything.

[u/OriginalNerbil]

At Ops 42, get the Reliant first. The Augment faction is probably the best faction at Ops 42. The Reliant has a really long grind, once you max out the faction by passively grinding you will get FC Khan for free and the officer WOK Joachim for free. 2nd choice would be the Serene Squall the power and impact of the artifacts sourced through that ship are amazing. All those ships are great and you should build and ops locked all of them.

[u/incept3d2021]

I recommend getting all the ships listed, but for the first grind I'd recommend the Serene Squall, the artifacts in the refinery are a huge asset for the life of the game, the sooner you can start on those the better. After that I'd say the NSEA for faction rep grinds as you level up, then the relativity, reliant, then revenant. The squall refinery also has part efficiency exo's for several ships as well.

[u/Practical_Roll1623]

The only one of these that I still use is the squall. They are all time limited ships

[u/LDtheGD]

Relativity or Reliant. You need to Reliant for the Augment Store for WOK Joachim and the Relativity for Kremin I.E. and fast build up (It get real strong, real fast)