Main Chems/Repairs on a pyra are supposed to be easiest and account for most of the survivability of the ship even after the nerf. It just required more teamwork and better timing. also, if you are standing still as a main engineer on a pyra you are doing it wrong.
A good chem on a pyra will take into account 5 things: The hull, the 3 engines and the side gun. With a good chem or swift extinguisher on the balloon and permahull left weapon, the pyra can run into as many fire as it wants.
Remember: animations and sounds are de-synced from the actual effect on the component. You don't need to stand there and wait. this applies to every engineer tool.
there are different types of chem loops, those are the ones I call on my ship:
Movement chem: Ship is approaching target, maneuvering into position, avoiding long range enemy fire. Your priority is the health of the engines but you will maintain the hull chem.
Defensive chem: Ship is under piercing assault (ping sound), hull breach expected, if available the second engineer drops down (you have to make the call at about half armor health) and sits on hull ready for rebuild. you will chem hull only if hull is not dropping (ie: the enemy gatling is reloading) or immediately after rebuild. Ignore all other fires and instead repair the engine components (fire damage on engines is negligible at this stage compared to permahull damage).
Assault chem: Ship is breaching enemy hull with piercing weapon, second engineer is ready at the weapon, you are taking damage in the process but in the next 30 seconds you could score a kill. Your objective is to keep a 70% efficiency of all components and full health on the side weapon. Don't be a perfectionist.
Tank chem: In situations where more than one opponent is firing on your ship the captain will call "tank" and rapidly disengage using all assortments of tools. Second Engineer will sit on balloon, Gunner will drop down and sit on hull, constantly spamming the wrench. You will make sure engines are healthy for disengagement and be next to the hull when it drops below 20%. The objective is survival.
Ram chem: The pilot will call for a ram in the next 12 seconds. it means the destruction of the enemy is imminent. it is a very tricky moment where you have more don't that do: Chems are irrelevant. Immediately repair all engines for the moonshine with mallet and don't touch them again until the ram is called off, you could modify the trajectory involuntarily. The second thing you have to make absolutely sure is that hull armor is going to hold up for the expected impact damage. You have one mallet hit, make it count: all 250 hp of repair must be used so you might want to wait for a sizable amount of armor to be drained (possibly mid ram) before hitting it. Once you mallet it, run for the engines, mallet them and use the side weapon on the just rammed target if it is too stubborn to die yet. congratulations, this is your kill more than anyone else on the ship.
I am short of time, so this is the Movement Chem also known as Pleasure Ride
T 0You want to start with the hull. This is your "first chem run". You have now 25 seconds for the chem to wear off, the equivalent of 2 rubber mallet hits. You want to mentally count to 20 and spray the right engine, the main engine from the bottom, the left engine, the side gun and be back at the hull.
it took you less than 9 seconds to chem all components, if you did this right. Notify the crew "We are chemmed".
Now what? This is the moment where you have to make independent tactical choices that will define the engagement
T 10-14- Component damaged? Skip chem. Either Spanner or Mallet depending on level of damage
- Side weapon's ammo not loaded? Skip chem. Load required ammo
- Component undamaged. Run chem, timer goes back to 0 when you chem the hull
if you made any of the first two choices, it means you are still counting from your first chem.
Any hit with mallet after T 14 means you will have to skip chem on that component.
T 15-24 is chem time. No matter what, you will chem. the component could have a slither of health, you will chem it.
Once you chem the hull, T is 0
