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« on: September 06, 2013, 07:18:40 PM »
EDIT: The patch notes were updated that the new maximum damage reduction from armor will be 85%, not 90%. Some of the info in this post is now outdated.
In case you haven't read the latest patch notes, armor will now provide a maximum damage reduction of 90% (up from 75%). This post is just to give you an idea of what exactly that means. To sum it up- armor just became a LOT more formidable. Also, damage per shot becomes MUCH more important the more armor your target has. Skip to the bottom for a rundown on how most of the weapons will be affected.
How I came to my conclusions
To recap how armor currently works, Actual damage = (Base damage * Base damage)/(Armor + Base damage). Actual damage then gets reduced by the explosive/kinetic/fragmentation armor multipliers (.5/2/.25 respectively). As a result, the minimum damage of kinetic weapons is currently 12.5% and explosive's is 50%. Armor isn't exactly uniform, though, so that calculation isn't perfect, but it's close enough. Also, I'm not really sure when damage starts bleeding through to the hull, but it would be nice to know. Also, I have no idea how beams are affected by armor. For reference, the minimum damage of kinetic weapons will be 5% and explosive's will be 20%. Frag damage will be nigh useless against armor, doing only 2.5% of its damage.
To give you a simple way to determine what effect that will have on the current weapons, multiply their damage by 3 and apply explosive/kinetic/frag multipliers. Anything with more armor than that takes less damage. For example, The Arbalest Autocannon does 150 damage per shot. 150*3*.5 = 225. Currently, anything with more than 225 armor will only take 12.5% of the 150 damage, for 18.75 damage per shot. Ships with more armor than 225 armor will now take less damage from the Arbalest.
Now, multiply a weapon's damage by 9 and apply damage type multipliers. Anything with that much armor or higher will only take 10% damage. Continuing with our Arbalest example, anything with 675 or more armor will only take 5% damage, for 7.5 total. For an Autocannon to deal more than minimum damage against a ship with 750 armor (like an Enforcer), it would take about 10 shots to the same spot. Against something like an Eagle with 1000 armor, you'd have to expend about 1/3rd of its ammo hitting the same spot to reduce its armor enough simply to deal more than minimum damage.
To figure out the strongest hit a ship can take while taking minimum damage, a good estimate is to divide the armor by 10 (The exact number would be to divide by 9. The estimate is lower than what it can actually take, but easier to calculate). That number is how strong a weapon can be and still deal minimum damage (be sure to apply damage type multipliers). For example, if you have 1000 armor, you would take minimum damage from something that deals 111 base damage, so only 11 damage taken. This means you could get hit by a kinetic weapon that deals 222 base damage and take only 5% of that (11 damage), or get hit by an explosive weapon that deals 55 damage and take 20% of that (11 damage).
Implications
In the next patch, it will be extremely wasteful to let kinetic weapons hit armor. Pulse weapons and beams will also have a very tough time punching through armor, which necessitates blasters, plasma cannons, or strike weapons/fighters to kill anything in a reasonable amount of time.
Against anything bigger than a Destroyer (and even the Enforcer is quite the tough nut to crack), energy weapons with unlimited ammo, strong explosive weapons, strike weapons, or strike fighters will be necessary. Going without will mean cracking the armor of anything bigger than a destroyer will take an eternity, or you risk running out of ammo for your ballistic weapons. Pulse lasers are fairly lackluster, so bringing a blaster or two now seems fairly mandatory. Also, the Combat skills that consider your armor doubled for damage reduction purposes and consider your weapon damage doubled for damage reduction purposes are now EXTREMELY useful.
This is just theorycrafting, but I think it may be warranted to change all the Pulse weapons to have slightly higher damage per shot and lower rate of fire, keeping DPS and flux efficiency the same. They're hit quite hard by the change, and there are barely any alternatives. If there were other options besides blasters and beams, I'd say they're fine as-is. My thoughts on other weapons are below.
Examples
EDIT: The minimum damage and amount of armor required to make weapons deal their new minimum are outdated. I may or may not update things later.
This part is to provide more detail on how the changes affect the guns. The numbers displayed are the old minimum damage per second, the new minimum damage per second, the amount of armor required to make it deal its old minimum damage, and the amount of armor required to make it deal its new minimum damage. Basically, the higher the numbers, the better the weapon is against armor.
NOTE: Strike weapons have minimum damage instead of minimum dps listed, since their damage is more relevant.
Ballistics
Light Assault Gun= 80, 32, 240, 720 (Heavily affected by the armor change, but still has decent dps against armor)
Light Autocannon= 12.5, 5, 75, 225
Light Machine Gun= 19.5, 7.8, 37.5, 112.5
Light Mortar= 37.5, 15, 450, 1350 (Surprisingly reasonable at cracking armor, but still terrible. Quite cheap, though)
Light Needler= 18.375, 7.35, 75, 225 (All of the Needlers, and nearly all kinetic weapons, are now quite terrible against armor, but that's fine)
Railgun= 20.875, 8.35, 150, 450
Vulcan Cannon= 18.75, 7.5, 11.25, 33.75 (Hit HARD by the armor change. Talons need a slight buff now maybe? =p)
Arbalest Autocannon= 18.75, 7.5, 225, 675
Assault Chaingun= 133.5, 53.4, 240, 720 (Heavily affected by the armor change, but still has decent dps against armor)
Dual Flak Cannon= 28.44, 11.375, 112.5, 337.5
Flak Cannon= 12.5, 5, 150, 450
Heavy Autocannon= 26.75, 10.7, 150, 450
Heavy Machine Gun= 40, 16, 60, 180 (Not completely terrible against armor, but explosive weapons are still much better)
Heavy Mauler= 125, 50, 1500, 4500 (Nearly unaffected by the change, great for cracking armor)
Heavy Needler= 26.375, 10.55, 75, 225
Hypervelocity Driver= 17.25, 6.9, 412.5, 1237.5 (Decent against armor despite being kinetic, but low ammo and dps)
Thumper= 28.125, 11.25, 67.5, 202.5
Gauss Cannon= 43.75, 17.5, 1050, 3150 (Another kinetic that's decent against armor, but low ammo)
Hellbore Cannon= 250, 100, 4500, 13500 (Completely unaffected by the change, great against armor)
Hephaestus Assault Gun= 240, 96, 720, 2160 (Hurt a bit by the change, but fine)
Mark IX Autocannon= 43.5, 17.4, 300, 900 (Hurt quite a bit by the change, but not completely terrible against armor)
Mjolnir Cannon= 133.25, 53.3, 1600, 4800 (Nearly unaffected by the change, actually worth considering now)
Storm Needler= 93.625, 37.45, 112.5, 337.5
Energy Weapons (including Thermal Pulse Cannon)
NOTE: Beam weapons omitted because I have no idea how armor affects them
Antimatter Blaster= 300, 120, 3600, 10800 (Basically unaffected by the change, great against armor)
IR Pulse Laser= 26.5, 10.6, 105, 315 (Does less dps to armor than a light mortar. That's just sad)
Ion Cannon= 12.5, 5, 75, 225
Heavy Blaster= 100, 40, 1200, 3600 (Mostly unaffected by the change. Probably your best non-strike choice for armor cracking)
Mining Blaster= 75, 30, 1800, 5400 (Great at cracking armor, but terribly inefficient otherwise)
Pulse Laser= 56.75, 22.7, 225, 675 (Hit hard by the armor change, but still has infinite ammo)
Autopulse Laser= 250(50), 100(20), 300, 900 (Hurt a lot by the armor change, but still has infinite ammo)
Plasma Cannon= 140.75, 56.3, 2250, 6750 (Basically unaffected by the change, great against armor. Very inefficient otherwise, though)
Thermal Pulse Cannon= 312.5(62.5), 125(25), 750, 2250 (Hurt a bit by the change, but still good)
Missiles
NOTE: Most missiles omitted because they're mostly unaffected by the change
Also, instead of minimum dps, it lists minimum damage per shot
Annihilator Rocket Launcher/Pod= 100, 40, 1200, 3600 (Mostly unaffected, so still great)
Sabot SRM (Pod/(Single))= 93.75, 37.5, 1125, 3375 (Mostly unaffected, so still decent)
Salamander MRM (Pod)= 31.25, 12.5, 375, 1125
Swarmer SRM Launcher= 18.75, 7.5, 225, 675 (Like getting hit with a Pulse Laser, but very limited ammo)