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So the big star of the 3.3 patch is the Hammerhead Corvette. This ship is takes the record for largest (combat) ship in game. So here it is in all its glory. My first impression is the layout is a mixed bag. It's very easy to navigate with well marked signs in the hallways and floor paint, but the actual room layout makes no sense. There's 3 decks, the lowest deck contains the bridge, the top deck only contains the mess hall, and the middle deck contains everything else. It feels really strange that the mess hall and crew quarters are on separate decks. The bridge is styled like a starship bridge from Halo or the new Star Trek where it sits on the bottom of the ship slightly back. I actually like that for a ship of this size as that makes it easier to land. Capability wise, its caked in rather large guns, but this ship is one of the few combat ships in game that doesn't hit above it's weight class. That's actually what most people expected, as this ship was advertised as a gunboat to handle fighters. The issue is, these turret guns are way bigger than ideal for fighters. This puts the Hammerhead in a weird spot where the ships prime combat capability is actually against other ships of comparable size. The missile load-out really limits this capabilities of this ship. The Polaris corvette has less guns (of similar size), but the Polaris has large torpedoes allowing it to damage much bigger ships. The Hammerhead has 32 size 3 missiles, which are not made to go against big ships, rather fighters and smaller ships. Granted these are higher end missiles having EM guidance for one half, and cross-section image recognition for the other, but they're still size 3. This puts the Hammerhead in a super niche spot IMHO. The cargo bay has a drop down elevator that can easily store a ground vehicle, so that's a plus, but this ship is pretty solidly locked into one role against only a particular range of opponents. Very nice interior though. Perfect ship for FPS combat, nice wide corridors and multiple ways to get to each room. Handling wise, this ship doesn't seem very powerful. The engines take forever to get up to speed, but I want to do more testing before I make a conclusion on that.

So it's finally here. The Carrack from Anvil Aerospace. This ship is a complete meme in the Star Citizen community. First announced in November 2013, the Carrack has been subject to numerous redesigns for years. It became the ship "that would never fly." 6 years later, the ship has touched down on the PTU environment and even though I only have several hours with it I think I can make a pretty good first impression. First thing is first. The Carrack is the most well designed ship in Star Citizen. No, I'm not talking about aesthetics. The functional layout and space efficiency is incredible. The ship feels far larger than some of the other larger ships in the game. With the 890 being the obvious exception, all of the other large ships in Star Citizen do not feel as big in the interior as the Carrack, and that's due to how efficient the space was used. In addition, the design flows really well unlike the Hammerhead or Reclaimer. The 890's interior is obviously a step above the Carrack just from sheer size and the fact it's a luxury yacht. The Carrack has a pool table in the crew lounge; the 890 has an actual swimming pool. It's precisely this efficient interior design that gives the Carrack a deceptively small appearance. From a distance the Carrack looks significantly smaller than it is. Other design decisions make the ship very user friendly. Regular size docking collars are on the neck far from the "wings". There is an airlock for EVA on the roof of the ship, the first ship in SC to actually allow roof access in environments with gravity. There are both elevators for regular use, and ladders for emergency use that connect each of the decks. The vehicle bay is extraordinarily spacious, easily fitting two full size rovers. The ships layout is complex. It has multiple pathways to each of the decks, and the corridors are spacious. It's a great ship to experience boarding action. With an on board medical suite and large armory, it becomes a great platform to launch ship boarding attacks, or ground assaults. The hangar is actually a weak link, offering slightly more capability than the Constellation series of ships by allowing the docking of a handful of slightly larger warp-capable ships than the standard snub class fighters from Krueger. Still, use of the Pisces in this hangar (which was purpose designed for that role) gives you a lot more capability than regular snub aircraft, but the size limitation really does limit the hangar. Now for capability. Unfortunately, despite what so many people hypothesized over the years, the Carrack is not a good combat ship. The lack of pilot controlled weapons make the ship with a single crew member completely combat incapable. With crew, you have several manned and remote turrets featuring S4 dual mounts. This is not something that can be used offensively. Even engaging an under-crewed Hammerhead is not going to be winnable. The Carrack's armament is going to be effective in a defensive stance only, and only against small-medium class ships. The lack of missiles and very limited overlap of turret arcs means you will not be able to damage large to capital class ships, and your hangar bay doesn't have the capability to ferry ships with heavy ordnance. So the Carrack will only be able to contribute to combat in a supportive or defensive role. Most Carrack owners probably knew this going in, but some people had hope. The Carrack's cargo hold is impressive: Compared to the other ships currently in game, the Carrack is among the top of the charts. It won't be a "meta" cargo ship, but it will be competitive. Though as ship-to-station docking comes online and the dedicated cargo ships enter the game, the Carrack is going to be quickly and heavily outclassed. That being said, for it's price point it has a very impressive cargo. That's really the entire selling point of the Carrack. It really doesn't do anything spectacularly well. In every category, it doesn't exceed. It doesn't have the biggest hangar; it doesn't have the most guns. What it does do though is let you get close to the mark. It may not be a "meta" cargo runner, but you will be competitive and experience that gameplay far more in depth than you would expect. You would pay just as much for the Carrack as you would for any of the ships that are best in their role, but with the Carrack you wouldn't be locked into that role. So the value of the ship in this way is pretty extreme. The Carrack is a window into the future of Star Citizen, and a pretty good marker of how far the game has come. It shows us the game designers have really learned from years of making ships. While the Carrack isn't even in a perfect state right now (plenty of bugs, landing gear glitches, and how it eats me every time I EVA) it's going to become a poster child for what Star Citizen offers. It's also the first full size Anvil Aerospace starship (Valkyrie doesn't count) meaning that manufacturer is going to start popping up more with larger, military focused ships. You'll still want a Hammerhead if you want to go into a full on combat scenario, but the Carrack can do pretty much all the other jobs currently in Star Citizen right now.