Why am I Only getting higher ranks in battle tab?

I get from 30-90+ ranks ahead of me in the battle tab. I have not been an active pvp guy for a while, so it's not that I am needing harder opponents.

I Don't even think you could consider me a slow ranker either.

Anyone know what I can do to get better opponents? I would like to get some red badges.

what lvl are you and how much scan are you using?

109 and very little scan - 26 in fact

ahh so scan helps that?

the lower level folks are probably carrying some cloak, so yes, try boosting your scan

That did the trick! Thanks. Now I'm at 375. Had to sacrifice some weapons though.

Not sure what a good ratio for weapons/def/hull at my level but this seems to work fine with more scan and cloak.

At the lower to mid ranks, that is always a fun dance to figure out. I have observed that everytime I increase my cloak, I attract more random badgers. When I fly around bucky naked, I get left alone.

same, I have a fairly lowish cloak and only have 58 deaths at rank 442. Things will surely change though cos I am gonna be after my mk3 doms soon.

I'm at 265, but thats all from mission spoils... I would hate to junk them for little cash...

But is that advisable? It does add up to 80 decks... Some of the things provide defense or scanning AND cloak

When you say "junk em" I hope you don't mean "scrap." You certainly should not sell/ scrap any of the mission related or NPC related mods unless you have the next upgrade (i.e.- Dark Thrusters to Dark Phase Engine).

In terms of ship configuration, I am pro defensive strategies... so I wouldn't suggest taking off anything that loweres your def. If I had to guess where most players tend to "skimp" as they are building, it would be cloak/shield... though at 250, you are in the sweet spot where you are now wanting your shield to take over your hull.

Thanks King for your help!

Now your last comment, I need clarification. I have always ignored shield. It is lowest researched for me. I never install any shield modules nor use points for helmsmen. I am at 116 shields just with artifact helmsmen.

My play style is that I check in regularly, so have just healed hull as needed.

Are you saying you would advise getting my shields up to hull level? wow.

I re-read my post and forgive me for not being more clear. My comment was more in reference to the Hull vs Shield debates... in short, hull will always techincally be more effecient since it takes up less deck space. However at some point (usually rank 200+) ships to start to focus more on adding shields since they clearly regen themselves. At rank 250, you should be starting to make that transistion. I don't think your shields will ever surpass hulls though; but I could be wrong. Some high ranker will have to answer that... I think most of them still have more hull than shields. With 20k hull, they might be running 16k shields. Again, I am just guessing at this point.

another large reason for shields is the they regen, also with that some lots of low or medium people who badge stop when they hit a trap as they don't have that much nulls to use on them. then usually if you have 3 or 4 k shield the would hit the trap before they hit your hull thus saving you from wasting you credits on hull repairs. also if people try attacks you for something(like disabling them or taking a planet and you are on their scan.) and won't stop because they hit a trap they could run out of energy and come back before you get back on to disable you, but if you have a massive shield it will have regenerated by then and stopped them again . if you plan just to disable a few npc ships you won't take any damage to you hull as you shields toke all the damage.