Hello, Farrister here, and welcome back to
the channel. In this video, I’ll be reviewing
the Star Citizen ship, the Anvil F7CM Super
Hornet. Star Citizen is currently in alpha
testing, and the Super Hornet is one of the
flyable ships. The Super Hornet is a dual
seat combat fighter, meaning you can bring
a friend along with you.
I’ve followed the usual format for this
review, splitting into 5 sections, starting
with a ship tour and deck flow, assessing
combat performance, reviewing handling and
visibility, looking at the operating and purchasing
costs, and finally summarising. I’ve included
timestamps in the video description to help
navigate to each part of the review. If you
enjoy this review, please do subscribe to
the channel if you aren’t already, that
helps you to be notified of future videos,
and helps me to grow the audience.
Part One: Ship Tour & Deck Layout
This part of the review is very easy for the
Super Hornet. There are no decks to really
talk about, just 2 seats – a front pilot
seat, and a rear copilot seat. That’s it,
nowhere to walk about, nowhere to visit the
facilities. This is a combat ship and every
inch of it is dedicated to combat. Access
is via a ladder located on the left or port
side of the fighter. Only one person can get
in at a time. But that’s about it.
Part Two: Combat Performance
So, as a heavy combat fighter, the weapons
options are fairly good. The nose can either
equip a turret with a double size 1 weapon
layout, or alternatively, switch that for
a nice fixed size 3. It’s the same for the
2 wing mounted weapons, coming with a gimbaled
size 2 weapon by default, but also swappable
for a fixed size 3. And finally, the ball
turret, adding to the firepower with a dual
size 2 weapon layout. It’s also possible
to swap out that ball turret for a single
size 4 weapon. There are 8 size 1 missiles
in the stock variant.
So, for the footage it’s important to point
out that I’ve swapped out the 3 pilot weapons
for Mantis GT220s, which are my go to weapon
in Star Citizen.
So, to begin with, the firepower is the same
whether you have a copilot gunner or not.
With the back seat empty, the ball turret
simply goes to pilot control. So you don’t
lose out by operating the Super Hornet solo.
The advantage of having a rear gunner is that
the Super Hornet could engage more than 1
target at the same time, and covering a wider
arc.
And that firepower is fairly good. The Super
Hornet feels like a heavy fighter, especially
when all the guns are brought on target. The
missiles give a nice little extra punch. It’s
quite happy engaging larger ships such as
a Cutlass or Constellation, but doesn’t
feel quite so happy if they return fire.
That’s because the real challenge is survivability.
In fairness, the Hornet feels well armoured
and bulky – that is to say, it’s very
easy to lose parts off the fighter and keep
flying and fighting. But, it’s also very
easy to lose parts, largely due to the 2 size
1 shield generators not doing a very good
job of keeping you safe. That’s a real shame,
especially when I start to compare the Super
Hornet to the Vanguard that I reviewed recently,
they just feel very different.
Part Three: Handling and Visibility
Starting with visibility, and as you might
expect from a fighter, the cockpit gives for
great all around visibility. Other than the
support struts, which I suspect are there
to add an X-wing vibe, there’s nothing really
to impede the pilots vision to the front or
sides. And although there isn’t any window
beneath the pilots feet, it’s still very
easy to take off or land with the Super Hornet
owing to the canopy design.
In the cold vacuum of space, the Super Hornet
handles very well, particularly at space combat
manoeuvring speeds. Although tangibly heavier
than some of the light fighters, the nose
still points very responsively, and notably
the ball turret when human operated has a
very quick gimbal. The Super Hornet accelerates
and decelerates well, including to higher
cruise speeds. It’s worth mentioning though,
that if she has taken combat damage, that
can degrade the turning performance somewhat,
as invariably some of the thrusters are the
first to go.
In atmosphere, particularly with the updated
atmospheric flight model, the Super Hornet
handles fairly well. It’s not the most nimble,
but it’s easy to control, and with bursts
of afterburner fuel can kick the rear back
to where you’re pointed. It’s still comfortable
to fly in atmosphere or near the surface of
a moon, and doesn’t feel dangerous to get
nice and low.
Part Four: Operating Costs
Rearming and refueling the Super Hornet is
cheap. I’ve really not seen the costs anywhere
above a few hundred alpha UEC. Repairs can
add up to a few hundred, but if you’ve been
doing missions, you should comfortably make
a profit.
The Super Hornet doesn’t have any cargo
storage, or anywhere to place physicalised
boxes, which means it’s largely restricted
to combat contracts. It can do fairly well
in that space – I’m sure a good pilot
could take on the claim jumper missions, but
I found myself sticking to the contracts where
I knew the enemy wouldn’t have too much
firepower. But if combat is your bag, it’ll
turn a profit.
I was quite surprised by the range of the
quantum drive, as although the stock drive
is very slow, actually the Super Hornet has
got a range which covers most of the Stanton
system.
Part Five: The Verdict
Thinking about the potential for the Super
Hornet to be a fighter aboard a larger ship
such as an Idris, I could see that making
for some quite interesting gameplay. Particularly
it feels comfortable to make short hops between
moons, and it’s great for getting to the
surface of a planetary body.
As a standalone ship in the ‘Verse right
now though, it’ll only do 1 thing – Combat.
And it doesn’t feel like the most confident
choice for Combat either. Particularly for
those looking to get a couple of players aboard,
something like a Cutlass or Vanguard would
feel much more appropriate. And that’s the
confusing thing for me, at 165 dollars or
just over 2 million alpha credits, it’s
actually cheaper to buy a Cutlass which is
a more versatile ship. Sure it doesn’t pack
quite the same firepower, but it’ll allow
you to experience more content and still comes
with a relatively strong armament.
So I’m a bit torn on this one. Super Hornet
has been my go to fighter since the early
days of Arena Commander. When I dug it out,
I really wanted to like it more, I think it’s
just let down by the weak shields. And because
they’re just size 1, there aren’t any
super attractive upgrade options for that.
Which is a real shame.
Once again, thank you to all those of you
who subscribe to my channel, please press
that like button if you enjoyed watching.
For anybody looking for a group who plays
the current patch of Star Citizen regularly,
I’ve included a link to my organisation
in the video description. And to close out,
thank you for watching, and I hope you’ll
hear from me in the next video.
