Esperia Talon: The best stealth ship for Pyro?

As I sit here nursing an absolutely fucking epic methotrexate hangover (chemo is a hell of a drug, and I get to do the easy mode version), fighting both headaches and nausea (why the fuck does Grav CMS's admin not have a built-in dark mode yet), I decided.. Hey, let's talk about my latest ship acquisition in Star Citizen: The Talon.

I grabbed the Talon (in-game - more on that in a bit actually) because I haven't owned many alien-themed ships, and figured.. Why not. I've got the aUEC to spend, so let's grab another stealth-themed ship to go along with my Sabre (preferred stealth Sabre loadout here) and my Mirai Razor EX (such a fun little ship, seriously). I love stealth, and I love new shiny things.. And boy, is the Talon shiny.

Coated in a chroma-shifting paint job, the Talon is quite obviously themed like a bird of prey, and it's beauty tends to bely it's relatively low cost.. And exceptionally low cost to kit out with upgraded parts.

As of writing, it only costs about 3.2 mil aUEC. That's cheap, and you can earn that after a few higher-tier bounties in Pyro. What's even better is that my recommended loadout costs less than an additional 400k aUEC, making this ship incredibly affordable to absolutely stomp bounties in Pyro to earn even more money quickly.. And it's also got the versatility to go with it. Let's break down the loadout:

I only replaced 3 things (and removed one) here to optimize this (and keep in mind, this is all with equipment purchaseable in-game: No grinding necessary for this gear). I swapped out the 2 cannons for Attrition IVs (feel free to use laser repeaters if you want something more PvP-able), I changed out the shield generators for Targas, and I upgraded the QT drive to a Zephyr.. Oh, and I stripped out one of the coolers (with the base Stealth A powerplant, you only need 1 Vaporblock cooler to cover it, reducing your signature overall).

With this hardware I went with the following power configuration for general running & stealth bounties: 3 pips to weapons (that's the max available), 1 pip to engines, 2 pips (half power) to the shields, and cutting life support.

This puts my overall signature down to below 2km at the front, and given the Attrition IVs have a 3km range, you're golden to pound away at bounties from afar with plenty of cushion.. AND you've got shields active in case you get discovered, so you can get away quickly without risking any actual hull damage! This is great for running bounties in Pyro just because your target tends to be separated from the other foes, and the payout is really good on them. Since it's not as stealthy from it's worst angles (4.6km visibility at it's worst), having that extra ohshitohshit cushion is good.

Plus, this thing is incredibly maneuverable. She's a dancer on the wind, friends.

Anyway, let's talk about some of the downsides, however, because there are a few.

The Talon is a bit squishy: Those wings can get clipped really quickly in a prolonged fight, so mind your shields, mind your missile warnings, and mind the fuck, did you just strafe into a goddamned asteroid again?!

It's QT fuel is pretty limiting, too: You've got 1.1 SCU of QT fuel, which means you'll need to plan your trips in Pyro accordingly. Still, I had no problem running 6 bounties in a row starting out at Checkmate station, and came back to the barn with fuel to spare.

As I noted earlier, it's stealth is good, but the cross-section at it's worst is much higher than something like the Aegis Sabre (3.8km at worst on the Sabre vs. the Talon's 4.6km).

The ship itself does have one relatively major accessibility issue: Almost all HUD elements are red. This means telling if a QT marker is target-able or not is next to impossible.

And, finally, there is a weird bug that's been in-game for a while that's a severe nuisance: When toggling out of nav (quantum) mode, your cockpit windows will all go opaque. I get around this by - after switching off nav mode - immediately toggling power on the ship, which gets the windows showing what's around you yet again. Still, not great if you're in an oh shit, what did I just quantum in to moment.

Still, I've really fallen for this pretty little burb of a ship, and will continue to fly it for some time, I'm sure. Hell, I may even spend some of my credit after melting my old Redeemer to ensure I have one in my hangar after every wipe.