When command ships received their first rework, the cargo hold remained at 400m3.
When command ships received their second rework, the cargo hold still remained at 400m3.
Now with the command burst range of a heated long point, iE Astarte boosts itself, could we please have that cargo hold checked? Those 400m3 are 15 navy CB 800s and half a reload of void M.
That hold should at minimum be large enough for a standard container and some spare space to buffer, but right now we have something like this:
1x Medium Cargo Container, 1x Navy CB 800, ammo, happy dragging, also your max runtime is around 5 minutes so you better be quick and get out again afterwards.
Tl;didn’t even read that: Supposedly active tanked ship requires cap booster, has no cargo space for cap boosters.
It’s been a long time since I flew the Astarte, and while otherwise certainly a nice ship with much character, the small cargo hold just disqualifies it for active tanking, not because 15 is too few and 16 would be enough, but the competition offers so much better choices. Testing it after the last round of buffs has many changes you don’t notice and the unchanged cargo hold still makes little sense.
The number of stored cap boosters being your endurance, for an active brawler it doesn’t have the endurance to make it worthwhile. Now post agility buffs, the ship feels nicer in a category you do not exactly felt it needed help in the first place, the PG buff makes plated fittings actually fit decently, but the cargo hold is still a giant question mark.
If you compare it to the Sleipnir, the other premier solo CS, the 2XLASBs together with the respective, barely larger hold make it worthwhile (especially as you don’t have to chug cap boosters to keep firing under neuts and minimal damage), but on the Astarte it’s significantly too short-lived. A hold closer to the Nighthawk/Vulture or Drekavac would be adequate.
Bottom line, it is hamstrung by a stat you usually don’t even pay attention to, and quite heavily so.