Star Citizen, the MMORPG set in an ever-expanding ‘verse, is full of starships. Lots and lots of starships. That’s the point of the game, actually: to get in a spaceship, fly around, and do cool stuff in space.
Today we take a look at another Star Citizen ship. But not just any ship.Â
The Anvil Aerospace Valkyrie.
The Valkyrie is a unique ship because it was the first drop ship designed by Star Citizen. And if I’m being blunt, it is still the best. The developers went a little overboard with the Valkyrie and made it so well-rounded that there isn’t another drop ship in the game that stands up to its full capabilities.
Unfortunately, the Valkyrie is a one-use ship. If you’re not going into intense combat and don’t have two dozen friends to hop on board and blow stuff up with you, the Valkyrie is a reasonably useless ship. It was designed to blow things up as efficiently as possible.
It was made to carry many troops, get into a combat zone as quickly as possible, and get out even quicker. If you do not intend to kill lots of people, you might consider a ship other than the Valkyrie.
But if you want to kill as many people as possible in Star Citizen, let me tell you why the Valkyrie is probably your best bet. Welcome to a Star Citizen Valkyrie Guide.
Key Info Up Front
The Valkyrie can carry 20 soldiers and four ground vehicles of medium size. It has four manned turrets, two pilot-controlled weapons, and costs 4.5 million UEC in-game, or $375.
Is it worth it?
Ehh. Up to you.
The Valkyrie’s Hull
Listen up, lieutenant. The mission before you is fraught with danger. You’ll have more bogeys on your tail than a goose flying south in the fall. And you’ll have more bullets coming your way than the Allies did on D-day.Â
But you were chosen for this mission, lieutenant, because you’re good at flying and like blowing things up. And we’ve got the perfect ship to complement your skills.
Just look at her.
Anvil Aerospace’s original hybrid, the dropship that’s a gunship, and the gunship that’s a dropship: the Valkyrie.
Once you take command of this ship, your job is not to hang around in space and play cat and mouse with other starships. Your job is to jump into the combat zone with surgical precision, drop off your payload and get out.
Thanks to the four VTOL engines this baby comes with, you will be there and gone before anyone knows what happened.
Her vehicle bay will hold four manned Cyclones, she’ll have a whole crew of five, and there will be another 20 soldiers in the personnel bay. Which means you’re in charge of a lot of people, lieutenant.
Thanks to the mounted YellowJacket GT-210 turrets at each access hatch, you can strafe the combat zone to help eliminate targets even after dropping off your payload. But only do so if the mission requires it, as the range of motion on those turrets is not ideal.
The backdoor can be opened while flying so that ground vehicles can deploy without the Valkyrie needing to land.
And if you’re in those vehicles diving out the back of the Valkyrie, it feels like the craziest game of Rocket League ever. If you do land to drop all your soldiers, you can activate a blast shield in the vehicle bay so the ground troops aren’t immediately inundated by gunfire.
All of your ship’s components are military-grade C. You can, of course, upgrade them to military-grade A, but that will come out of your pocket, lieutenant.
On The Inside
Deck 1
There are only two decks within the Valkyrie, and they aren’t separated by anything more than some cheap railing and a ladder.
There are three ways to enter the Valkyrie: the vehicle bay doors and the two personnel access hatches on each side of the ship. Both will lead you into the vehicle bay, where you can comfortably fit four Cyclones, URSA Rovers, STVs, or any other variation of a ground vehicle.Â
Unfortunately, this is not a cargo hold, so you cannot store cargo here. For those new to Star Citizen, yes, there is a specific difference between a cargo and a vehicle bay. While you may be able to stack some boxes in your vehicle bay, they will not be secure and won’t lead to any significant amount of revenue.
Just passed the vehicle bay are the drop seats. There are two personnel bays, each with ten seats. Beyond the personnel bay is access to the lower turret. The lower turret is one of the better ones; it’s a Mantis GT-210—superior range and firepower.
Deck 2
If we return to the vehicle bay, we will find a single ladder leading us up to the second deck. We exit the ladder and are immediately in the bunkroom/mess hall/rec room/navigation area. There are five bunks and a food processor to give you the comforts of home.
From the second deck, there is but some small railing that allows the crewmates to look down upon the first deck and their vehicles to check that everything’s ok.
The living area also has access to the second Mantis GT-210 turret between the bunks. Leaving the living area, we can access the two remote turrets on the Valkyrie, two Scorpion GT-210 turrets. There are no escape pods on the Valkyrie, so fight well.
Just past the Scorpion turrets is the bridge separated by a secure door. It’s not technically a bridge so much as it is a cockpit because it only seats one person. That’s right, you are a military school bus driver, one person in charge of the lives of 20-odd people. So don’t screw it up.
The cockpit could have better visibility, but thanks to the placement of the instruments, it’s easy to grasp the shape of the Valkyrie and not run into anything.
It’s Cool, But It’s Just A Video Game
Some people take Star Citizen way too seriously. Star Citizen is not a military simulation game; it’s honestly not designed well enough to be. It is a space simulation game. That’s clearly what the developers put their time, energy, and research into.
The architecture and layout of cockpits, the mechanics and intricacies of faster-than-light quantum engines, and how exactly an economy in space would work were the primary focus.
They were not so focused on weapons, gunplay, and the realism of an FPS firefight. Don’t believe me? Jump into Star Marine, and you’ll realize that 2014 CoD is better than 2023 Star Citizen when it comes to gunfighting.
But that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of factions, organizations, and lonely people within Star Citizen treating the game as an extension of their military career. No ship in Star Citizen draws those people more than the Valkyrie. It is, first and foremost, a military ship; it draws people that want to do military things.
And since it’s a ship that’s essentially useless if you’re by yourself because you can’t load vehicles or fire the turrets, you need a group of people to use it efficiently. So it reinforces the whole military lifestyle.
I enjoyed the time that I spent around and on the Valkyrie. I did not enjoy the communities of people I met along the way.Â
I have never looked at Star Citizen as anything more than a very immersive video game. Sure, I am respectful when I’m on someone else’s ship; I follow their rules and use their communication protocols. But at the end of the day, it’s a video game.Â
If you get furious at me because I didn’t say ‘clear’ when I jumped from the ship, we won’t get along. If you require a background check and a 10-page application for me to board your craft and fly a mission with you, I’ll find another ship.
If you’re crouching behind every single bit of cover, calling out every single enemy you see, and using call signs and milsim speak in every single engagement, you’re in the wrong place. It’s a space video game, dude. Chill.
I found that the people surrounding the Valkyrie saw Star Citizen as more than a video game. They took their roles aboard the Valkyrie as seriously as a soldier would in times of war. Now, I’m a fan of role-playing as much as the next D&D nerd, but I didn’t enjoy how it was handled in Star Citizen.
I felt like a 13-year-old playing airsoft in the woods, getting bossed around by other 13-year-olds who thought they were better than me because they had a camo bandana.
Is The Valkyrie Worth It?
Nope.
The Valkyrie without any upgrades is 4.5 million UEC. The stock components are military-grade C, so if you want to upgrade them to grade A, you’re looking at another one or two million UEC.
If you’re someone who plays Star Citizen with a group of friends or you’re a regular member of an organization or faction, then the Valkyrie is something you should seriously consider. Take all your friends, all their stuff, all their vehicles, and go blow shit up. No other ship in Star Citizen is so ideally suited to such a goal.
But because its design is so specific, it is hard to use for anything else. You could use it for bounty-hunting missions, as your many turrets will often outpower other ships.
And if you upgrade your engines and shield generators, few enemies will subdue you. You might even use it for rescue missions, as you can carry many soldiers home and use the vehicle bay to treat the wounded.
But even those alternative uses for the Valkyrie are still focused on combat. And there are a dozen other ships better suited to those alternative careers. If you want to mine asteroids, gems, and other components peacefully, do not consider the Valkyrie.
Valkyrie Alternatives
The Valkyrie is classified as a dropship. The technical description says, thanks to its “devastating array of weaponry, [it] blurs the line between dropship and gunship.”
I could toss out a few freight ships that have the capacity to carry tons of stuff and blow up even more, but I will only consider other dropships for this section.
As I already stated, there isn’t another dropship in Star Citizen that compares to the power and capacity of the Valkyrie, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t useful in other ways.Â
The Prowler
From Esperia, makers of alien-looking technology in Star Citizen, we have The Prowler. The Prowler looks intimidating. It looks like it wasn’t made by human hands.
It is the weaker, smaller cousin of the Valkyrie. It can hold eight soldiers, has room for one co-pilot, and is meant for rapid deployment.
It has weaker guns and armor than the Valkyrie, but since it’s smaller, it’s faster. You can maneuver much more nimbly and punch out of the system much quicker than a Valkyrie.
The Hoplite
Created by Aegis Vanguard, the Hoplite is another military ship through and through. Despite being shaped like the ship from Faster Than Light, It has the best armor of any dropship in Star Citizen, so let’s call this one the tank.
Alas, it can only carry six soldiers in its personnel bay, so make sure the teammates you pick up are veterans. The weapons systems will keep people out of your way, but the beefy defense acts as the most significant selling point for this craft.
The Cutlass Steel
Don’t want a Valkyrie? The Cutlass Steel is the next best thing. The Cutlass Steel is a mean-looking ship. Its massive interior can hold 16 soldiers for the quickest deployment around. It won’t have room for any ground vehicles, but that’s what all the Marines are for. It also has the most guns of any dropship.
They might only be level 3s, but more guns mean more damage. I might not be good at math, but I can do that simple equation.
Star Citizen Valkyrie Guide: FAQs
Question: If I stuffed extra people inside the ground vehicles that I squeezed in the vehicle bay, could I fit more than 20 people in the Valkyrie?
Answer: Look at you, thinking outside the box! Well, technically, inside the box. The deadly space box. Yes, you could carry more than 20 soldiers if you stuck them inside the ground transports.
Question: How fast could I load troops on Crusader and drop them off on Hurston?
Answer: Just under five minutes with the stock engines and thrusters of the Valkyrie. Which is pretty damn impressive.
Less than five minutes to go from planet to planet? When some ships take around 10 minutes? Not bad. But, if you want to cut that time in half, upgrade to military-grade A quality engines. You’ll be there in about 2 1/2 minutes.
Question: Can I paint my Valkyrie a pretty color?
Answer: It depends on what you define as a pretty color. But if you want to paint your Valkyrie different colors, yes, you can buy paint jobs. They all have a distinctly military feel but mix and match all you like.
The Valkyrie Lifts Off
The Valkyrie is an undeniably badass ship. It comes into a system with a bang, carries more troops than anyone else, and can hold its own in most fights. I wanted a Valkyrie for the longest time when I first started exploring Star Citizen.
It was a sobering day when I realized my credits would be better spent elsewhere. I don’t usually travel with a full crew of people; I’m very much a solo player. Games like Scorn are more up my alley since they’re single-player and story-driven.
So as much as I’d love to team up and take on some high-stakes missions, I’m much more suited to stealthy assassination missions. So I’ll stick with my Hornet for now.
But if you want to engage your faction more, team up with friends, or just flex how much money you earned in the game, check out Anvil Aerospace’s Valkyrie.
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