Let me reminisce for a moment.
When you look at combat movies from the second world war, one stands out for me personally and that’s “Destination Tokyo” starring Cary Grant. So what the heck does that have to do with the Romulan Pilot ship? Let me explain.
I don’t remember what first drew me to it. It’s black & white. It stars people I sort of recognize (OMG – It’s the Skipper from Gilligan’s Island!). Likely it was on at 2am, and I was getting home from work, and it was something to watch back when there was less than 200+ channels available.
What ‘got me’ was the sense of claustrophobia, of combat where you couldn’t see your opponent, and perhaps an awareness of the propaganda value it had for it’s audience. But most importantly it was one of the influences for the quintessential romulan episode from Classic Trek: Balance of Terror.
And that’s why I love Romulans. Balance of Terror. Nuff said.
The Romulan command ships were definitely cool, and that’s why I was excited about the Romulan Pilot ships. As with the previous 2 tests (Fed, KDF) I set up the Science version – the Jaeih Class Warbird.
It’s looks very sexy – my mix of hulls and wings.
Especially when it targets open fields in Oklahoma.
As before, I’ve settled on a dual-beam build. While cannons are definitely the way to go for single target dps, my piloting skills in combination with the pilot enhancement, I’ve found the dual beam route much more effective.
Being a Delta Recruit my gear is pretty much a mish-mash so I invested in some Vaardwar Polarons, Spire Vulnerability consoles, and a tonne of upgrades. One thing I have enjoyed about the Delta Recruit process is that having a fully-kitted crafting toon.
Like the two other pilot ships, the Romulan version performs as expected. I’ve become fairly adept at at using retros to keep myself on target, being able to deliver consistent levels of dps. What stands out as different is that I’m unable to maintain power levels as I had with the previous 2 builds partly do to the lack of the plasmonic leech. But with a battle cloak and the additional singularity abilities I found it a lot of fun to fly.
In fact, it’s become my favourite of the three.
Conversations with the Lootcritter 
I’ve been pining for this one!
Like I mentioned in the comments for the Fed Pilot ship, I expected better things from the Pilot ship. Turns out, I was right.
My setup, inspired somewhat on your KDF pilot ship, involved an arsenal of dual AP beams and the crystaline AP torpedo to the front, and the omni-directional AP beams at the back. Since I didn’t pack any cannons and that I found the Subspace Eddy console of dubious use, I only stuck to the 2pc set bonus. Contrary to my Mercury-reskinned Icarus, I struggled with my speed. However, as irony goes, my slapping the aegis hyper-impulse engine on my power-starved warbird actually works out nicely.
As for bridge officer powers, it’s the standard APO/APB cycle with torpSpread3 and fire at wills. I used the universal Boff station for an extra engineering boff (Et1, DCE-supported EPtS/EPtW, Aux2Damp). Science includes ST1, HE2, GravWell1. I’m light on shield heals, so, I count mostly on the Valdore console to keep them up.
I enjoyed the Faeht before this one, but – honestly – I’m finding my Jaeih to be somewhat superior. Surgical Strike was nerfed, and thanks to its console the Faeht was kind of cornered into being a plasma energy build. Enchanced battle cloak wasn’t that useful, and I’ve found the Heralds to be able to lock down HARD the Faeht and then destroy it with me having little ability to save myself.
By contrast, I’m finding the Jaeih more slippery (Pilot Maneuver feels more useful to a ambush-cloaker than Gather Intel was), and somewhat nastier due to having the console and Boff ability to cluster up opponents. It’s pretty handy! And grabbing AP weaponry synergizes better with my Superior Operative boffs.
I haven’t found many of the Pilot ship traits to be handy – most depend on staying at high speed, something I want to have the versatility to not do. I have the full pack, but I haven’t bothered to master the others (like I did on my Fed character) That voids the use of Pedal to the Metal as well (not that I’m very sorry – I hate the special effects of that trait).
I’ve also played with the ship costume, but ended up picking all Jaieh parts, with Type 4 material and the andromeda pattern. I’ve tried different other pieces, but the ship feels less bird-like and more batlike (more Reman), and I like the little “mandibles” the Jaeih has on each side of the beak, which narrows down my prefered choices a lot – so, I end up sticking to the paperdoll silhouette. I do wish the Jaeih looked as good as it did on the concept art, though – it flowed much better there. Translation to 3d was unfortunately chunkier. I also find that the ship’s impulse engines are unfortunately understated (nothing about this ship screams “I’m the fastest warbird ever”), and it feels like polygon-economy was a bit too much of a concern on the heads of the other variants (as in, the appealing beak-like heads from the concept art became boring wedge shapes).
I thought hard about if this ship would replace my Faeht (it was it, or me getting the fleet Faeht) and I figured that having what effectively is a Dhelan/mini-scimitar hybrid was too good to pass up. It’s the only ship that can pack 5 fore weapons aside from the Scimitar. Though, in hindsight, I probably could’ve just bought the Faeht and not the whole Romulan pack; not that I dislike it, but I could have gone without the microprojectile console.
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I’m also a Romulan lover, and the Delta Recruit event caused me to make a second Romulan who is fast becoming my de facto main. I’m more of a Diane Duane Rihanssu-loving guy than what the Romulans have become in the newer shows, but Balance of Terror is my favorite TOS episode, even over some of the more widely-loved episodes.
I fly the Okhala, but I made it look like the Jaeih class, as I liked that design the best. Loving this ship.
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