Opinion Question for the Community

Use slabs. Ignore thrust issues. Its a sizeable ship, as long as it moves, thats all that matters.

Edit: and dont be afraid to mix various armour types (hull, standard, advanced).

Edit2: and overdrive... you could always use overdrive if you want to get the top speed up a bit!

Thrust really isn't an issue with ships that size unless you have really thick armor all over (5-10m+). You can also stick systems inside of the big armor plate that's sitting in the top/back of the ship.

Besides, you won't have any amazing thrust/mass ratio with a ship that size so really don't worry about it.

Everything Sachys said. Use all 4 shades of grey to highlight the slabbing.

Motherboards, girders, circuits, scaffolds, grates, grilles, mesh and other low-mass "decorative" blocks can and should be used for their intended purpose. Build most of your filigree with it.

would highly recommend using only basic hull for your outer layer, it's extremely cheap and light relative to other armor types, and gives very adequate AHP, which is a vital stat and much more important than the EHP of individual blocks

As AHP is drained as a percentage of the HP of armor blocks destroyed, lots of adv and standard on the outer layer results in much heavier spikes of damage to your AHP when large & strong AoEs hit your outer layer. Essentially the tougher blocks are also more "brittle".

the stronger armor types are still important to protect key structures & systems inside your ship, buried behind the outer hull layer, where it will benefit from massive reductions to any damage that penetrates to them, as well as the AHP provided & better protected by the outer layer of hull.

Like in real life, you need your plate AND your gambeson to effectively protect yourself, only in SM the order is reversed due to AHP mechanics