Elite Dangerous: Fer-de-Lance vs Python

Fer-de-Lance Video ReviewPython pre-nerf Video Review

So which ship is better? There is no simple answer but i would say that Python is better if you are going to fight till death, because it is multi-purpose ship and has class 7 power plant that is enough to have power hungry weapons, shield boosters and shield cell banks at the same time, while Fer-de-Lance with power hungry weapons will have to sacrifice shields or/and modules, so mostly Fer-de-Lance will have weaker shields than Python even while shield base value (best shield generator without any boosters) for Fer-de-Lance is higher.

Fer-de-Lance is faster and will mass lock Python, so Fer-de-Lance will decide when the fight is over and just jump away, basically this means that 2 good pilots in each ship will never be able to kill each other if they do not want to die.

By fuel tank size and jump range winner is Python, it is multi-purpose ship after all, Python also has much bigger cargo bay, but the price is also twice as much as you would pay for Fer-de-Lance - around 100 million to 210 million Python.

No ships require any rankings so you can buy them as soon as you have enough money.

Hardpoints: I would say that Python has an advantage. First of all because Python is a large ship and medium hardpoints on Fer-de-Lance will have 33% damage penalty against Pythons hull transforming 4 medium hardpoints into 2,7, but that is only against hull and if we target power plant then it is not that important. Huge hardpoint on Fer-de-Lance is great but there are very few useful weapons now, still if you hit with Huge hardpoint enemy will feel that.

The biggest disadvantage for Fer-de-Lance is it's power plant, so Python always will be tanked more than Fer-de-Lance, unless Fer-de-Lance will sacrifice firepower a lot and that will not be a good choice.

Gimbaled weapons work much better on Python than Fer-de-Lance, so if you like gimbaled go for Python, but if you like sleek and fast ship that in a wing of 4 can be extremely dangerous because of mass locking other ships and speed then get a Fer-de-Lance.

But if we are talking about trading and missions (especially naval progression in build 1.2) then Python is much better choice.