Star Citizen 300 Series Review & Ship Buyers Guide
The 300 Series are a low-mid tier set of small single seater ships focusing on quality, form and a surprizing amount of facilities. I also think they look amazing with the recent 3.5.1 Alpha Rework of the ships.
General Ship Stats
All of the 300 Series share a common exterior with all that really changes is loadout & paint schemes.
The Ship is very long but not very wide being 27m in Length x 17m beam x 8m tall.
They range in mass from 58.5k to 72.5k kg
And stock SCM speeds from 204 – 258 m/s
Each of the variants all have small components (size 1)
With 2 Fuel intakes, tanks, coolers and shield generators & a single slot for all other components which is typical of a ship this size though only a few ships have 2 Fuel Tanks.
They have 12x gimballed maneuvering thrusters which gives them a lot of agility and strafe acceleration for their size.
And they are much bigger or at least longer than light & medium fighters. In fact the ship has stubby wings which reduce it’s beam compared to larger more traditional wings of other ships. The 300 is closer in length to a Cutlass (29m) than it is to a sabre (24m).
What you get for this is facilities they all have a bed and a toilet.
Other than the 350r they all have an expanded living area as well with more room, a sink and an area for food / drinks makers or what ever other little gubbins you want to add in the future as well as a suit locker and weapons rack for (2 rifle sized weapons) and maybe some other items at the top of the rack, grenades of pistols?
Facilities like this are going to be more important in the future with the Player Status System which tracks some light survival stats.
Beds allow you to log out more safely & rest. Toilets will be important for hygiene. Thirst and Hunger will also be a thing and the space to put a drink and food maker useful. As well as the space for FPS gear allowing you more flexibility.
Most other single seat craft do not have any facilities the 300 has great ones for it’s size even tho it’s been made larger for that purpose. This will give you a longer operating time and range.
Combat wise All of the ships are able to run full fixed or gimballed loadouts. Each coming with at least 2 Size 3 Weapon Mounts 1 on each wing and a different nose mount based on the variant. They also all have 2x S 2 Missile Racks other than the 325a which has a much larger loadout.
300i – Multi-Role / Base Model
If you’re going to travel the stars… why not do it in style? The 300i is Origin Jumpworks’ premiere luxury spacecraft is a sleek, silver killer that sends as much of a message with its silhouette as it does with its weaponry. Some have accused Origin of putting style over substance and inflating the sticker price to match… but at heart the 300i is still an elegant dogfighter’s tool.
The 300i is the Base Model of the range, I see it as not having as much as a focus as the other 300s, being able to do a bit of everything but not great at any one role. After you have moved past a starter ship in the game I see the 300i or Avenger Titan being the natural progression for multi-role or budget pilots.
It has a S3 Nose Weapon Mount so you can run a solid mono-boat loadout.
It’s the 2nd lightest of the 300 series by stock at 66.3k KG mass but also has the slowest speed SCM of 204m/s / 1190 max cruise
315p – Exploration & Utility
Exploration is man’s highest calling. Prepare to chart distant horizons with man’s most sophisticated piece of technology, the ORIGIN 315p. Featuring a more robust power plant and a custom scanning package, exclusively designed by Chimera Communications.
The 315p is listed and suggested to be an exploration ship BUT I think it’s really only slightly more focused towards that role.
The ship is suggested at having Long Range Engines, we will be getting the ability to buy and change into different thrusters in the future so maybe this will have stock better ones.
It has a S3 Tractor Beam as it’s Nose Mount though it’s listed as a utility mount so this might have other options for it in the future. Having a tractor beam does make it really useful for helping with salvage, mining, grabbing loot and cargo & even helping ships out of atmosphere.
It does have additional cargo capacity compared to all the other 300s 12SCU rather than the base 300i’s 8.
The enhanced Scanning Suite should allow for some more focused exploration and discovery gameplay BUT to what extent we don’t know yet.
Though it has some exploration advantages (unless that scanner is AMAZING) it’s not going to have a massive advantage over or at least range over the rest of the 300 series it doesn’t have the fuel capacity, it’s a small ship, it may be more efficient tho.
When it comes to exploration gameplay as well, this crosses over with science, surveying, scanning type gameplay and that’s what I expect the ship will be useful for short to mid range utility, survey & discovering POI. It may well be players “starting” ship for the exploration and those mentioned roles.
The ship is heavier than the 300i at 69.2k KG but also faster SCM at 210 m/s / 1225 max cruise
325a – Combat / Dogfighting
Just because it’s a rough galaxy doesn’t mean you need to sacrifice your comfort: the 325a can come out on top in any dogfight. The 325a features an advanced weapon payload as well as a custom targeting system designed especially for the 325a by WillsOp.
It has a S4 Nose Mount for it’s Weapon
The ship has lots of missiles hard points 2 S3 and a S5
Just as a reminder of how missiles work in the game, you can typically fit a mounts allowing you to have upto a single missile of the same size of the hardpoint OR 2 of a size smaller and that is multiplicative so a S3 could have 1S3 2S2 or 4S1, the S5 Mount in this case appears to currently be specific for the ship and unchangeable allowing for 4S3.
The Targeting System that it has is supposed to be able to missile lock onto multiple targets & then fire at all of them at the same time. I actually don’t think it’s that useful anymore, I would actually like just a quicker locking system for missiles, with the type of ship it is, that would make more sense, it’s only really in Arena Commander against waves of light enemies that I could see the multi-lock being useful and that’s only really to get you kills before another player XD That’s just my opinion, please share yours.
The heaviest of the 300 series at 72.5k KG but also the 2nd fastest SCM at 225 m/s / 1315 max cruise
350r – Racing
Origin Jumpwork’s 300 Series is the ultimate fusion of elegance and power. Every component, every part is individually calibrated, so no matter which model and options you choose, your ship will stay in perfect harmony as the ultimate in astroengineering. By far the fastest member of the family, the 350r refocus all of the 300’s power and translates it into pure speed.
The 350r has a Lighter Hull and is significantly lighter than the rest of the 300s at 58.5k KG this affords it Less effective Health BUT more agile, acceleration & faster with an SCM speed of 258m/s / 1345 max cruise. In the future there is going to be armor, a piercing system and physicalized components rather than ship health pools that we currently have.
The ship only has the Toilet & Bed rather than all the gubbins of the rest of the 300 series, which is still more than a lot of other small ships have.
It’s likely to be one of the best racing ships in the game, at least at certain courses in the future.
Cargo Space
The 300i has 8 SCU of Cargo Space with a cargo bay & lift underneath the ship that can be opened from the exterior centre port side of the ship.
The 315p has that centre bay with 8 SCU & a Rear Bay which is openable further towards the rear of the port side exterior with another 4 SCU so in total 12 SCU.
The 325a & 350r has 4 SCU with just the rear bay being useable.
The 325a has reduced cargo size as it has more missiles, however I was expecting the 350r to have 0 SCU with it being focused on being a racer and having it’s hull weight lowered BUT 4 SCU is plenty!
Ship Costs
All of these ships will be available in game to buy and rent. Potentially very soon actually with rentable ships in the PU coming with Alpha 3.6 BUT let’s talk about how much these cost now with IRL monies.
The 300i starts from $55 which is pretty reasonable however this puts it in direct competition with the Avenger Titan imo.
The 315p starts from $65 if you are purchasing with real money.
The 325a starts from $70 though at this price it’s competing with the Arrow Light Fighter & Avenger Titan.
The 350r starts at $125 and you are paying a lot for it being a racing ship.
Comparison & Recommendations
I love the look of the 300 Series BUT The Avenger Titan on paper is a better choice imo than a 300i or even the 325a. The Avenger Titan doesn’t have a toilet BUT it does have a bed & some FPS gear storage.
The Fact that the Avenger is only $50, has 8 SCU of Cargo Space and 2 S3s and 1 S4 weapon mount as well as 2 s3 missile mounts is amazing it’s cargo hold should be able to fit a Tumbril Ranger Bike as well, something that even the 315p even with both bays might not due to the way the cargo lift is done.
When you look at the 315p it does have more of a niche that utility mount that is going to be useful for a tractor beam as well as a “better” scanning array and might even be suitable for very small scale hauling as it’s 12SCU is actually quite a bit for a ship of it’s size.
The 350r is focused for Racing BUT would make a solid interdictor OR Personal Shuttle but it’s got racing ship tax inflating it’s price.
The 325a does have a lot of missiles but if I was going for a pure dogfighter I love the Arrow. I think it’s amazing, the 325a does have a bed, toilet and more though as well as a load of missiles.
Please remember this will all be available in game at some point and star citizen is constantly changing and evolving based on the needs of the game and feedback from the players so things might change.
I am interested to know your thoughts on the 300 series, do you like any of them?
Do you prefer something else like the Avenger Titan or Arrow or something else?
Do you own one already & love how amazing looking they are OR do you hate the Origin Brand? Whatever your opinions I would love to see them in the comments below.