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[anangryperson]

so i personally feel the the tactical laser needs kind of a heavy version of it. i was thinking like 185 damage, 225 flux, 1000 range, maybe 10-12 OP, a green laser (just to be OCD with the tactical laser).

i have also been thinking about an energy based missile along the lines of the mjolnir ballistic cannon. in the description it mentions a 1.8mm singularity being created when the round impacts and does its business. so why not have a missile that can create a 2mm singularity causing 550 energy damage and 250ish emp damage? maybe make it fast with good tracking? would it be too overpowered?

now i dont know the first thing about modding so i have no clue how to just make one of my own (i wish i did).

[Tartiflette]

The first sounds like the Heavy Mining Laser from Tiandong Heavy Industry, the second sounds like Blackrock Driveyard's Void Spear missile.

[TJJ]

185 damage, 225 flux

A flux negative weapon? (not even factoring in shield efficiency, which are almost universally <1.0)

[AxleMC131]

Thought I'd throw in a possibility - more just food for thought than anything. I'm pretty sure the Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam and High Intensity Laser are all part of the same line of weaponry. Think about it. They are all:
- Beam-type weapons
- Long range (1000 units)
- Fairly flux efficient

The difference is, they all deal different damage types. Whoulda thunk it? Over the set of the game's three main sustained beam weapons, we have energy, kinetic and high explosive damage to pick from. I only realised this recently, and I reckon it's kinda cool. Don't know if it was deliberate, but I'd like to think so.

[AxleMC131]

i have also been thinking about an energy based missile along the lines of the mjolnir ballistic cannon. in the description it mentions a 1.8mm singularity being created when the round impacts and does its business. so why not have a missile that can create a 2mm singularity causing 550 energy damage and 250ish emp damage? maybe make it fast with good tracking? would it be too overpowered?

On a separate note, I have one of these in my own personal modding files somewhere. It's called a Pulse-Charge torpedo, and technically is an MIRV. Very similar flight characteristics to the Atropos (short range, iffy tracking, but very fast) but when it gets near a target it fires off a single projectile directly at its target, dealing heaps of energy damage and some EMP as well. If I remember correctly, it's 1000 energy and 500 EMP damage for a successful hit. That sound sort of like what you were looking for?

[anangryperson]

i have also been thinking about an energy based missile along the lines of the mjolnir ballistic cannon. in the description it mentions a 1.8mm singularity being created when the round impacts and does its business. so why not have a missile that can create a 2mm singularity causing 550 energy damage and 250ish emp damage? maybe make it fast with good tracking? would it be too overpowered?

On a separate note, I have one of these in my own personal modding files somewhere. It's called a Pulse-Charge torpedo, and technically is an MIRV. Very similar flight characteristics to the Atropos (short range, iffy tracking, but very fast) but when it gets near a target it fires off a single projectile directly at its target, dealing heaps of energy damage and some EMP as well. If I remember correctly, it's 1000 energy and 500 EMP damage for a successful hit. That sound sort of like what you were looking for?

Yeah kind of. is it a large weapon slot?

[anangryperson]

185 damage, 225 flux

A flux negative weapon? (not even factoring in shield efficiency, which are almost universally <1.0)

not sure if i know what you mean. if by "flux negative" do you mean that it takes more flux to fire than damage is done, then yeah why not? a lot of weapons cost more flux than damage done; mining blaster, pulse laser, LR PD laser, heavy blaster... those are just the energy ones i can think of.

[anangryperson]

The first sounds like the Heavy Mining Laser from Tiandong Heavy Industry, the second sounds like Blackrock Driveyard's Void Spear missile.

I have the tiandong mod and that's what made me think. i like the heavy mining laser but its too weak, i know i can alter the weapon stats through notepad but it kind of feels like cheating even though the npc's could easily put it on their ships as well. I was thinking about a military grade version of that laser, like how there is the mining blaster and the heavy blaster, the mining laser and PD laser.

Im going to check out that blackrock mod, thanks for the info.

[TJJ]

185 damage, 225 flux

A flux negative weapon? (not even factoring in shield efficiency, which are almost universally <1.0)

not sure if i know what you mean. if by "flux negative" do you mean that it takes more flux to fire than damage is done, then yeah why not? a lot of weapons cost more flux than damage done; mining blaster, pulse laser, LR PD laser, heavy blaster... those are just the energy ones i can think of.

Those weapons you cite deal hard flux. (ex. LR PD laser which is obv. a PD weapon, not intended for flux trading).

A flux negative weapon that deals soft flux (e.g. your 'Heavy Tactical Laser') is actively detrimental to fire.
Its only marginally useful application would be against ships with much smaller flux reserves and/or very inefficient shields; though in those situations pretty much any other weapon would be adequate.

[Thaago]

It would be effective in a support role - on a ship that is firing but not taking heavy return fire. With the 1000 range, perfect accuracy, and the propensity for energy weapons to be on boats that can kite, thats something that could actually happen quite often. Unfortunately the player is almost always outnumbered, and this kind of support strategy relies on at least parity. I can see a heavy tactical laser being an annoying weapon in AI hands - like a HIL-light.

Given the inefficient flux profile, perhaps it could be branded as a "Continuous Mining Laser" - low tier to fit the unimpressive stats, but quite useful in a pirate fleet. I'd say 8 OP.

For a moderate tier weapon, I'd make the flux ratio 1:1 like the tactical laser and set the damage to 200, for 12 OP.

[Cik]

laser weapons in that mold seem all but useless to me. the time-on-target requirement to have any real effect on the battlespace is so high as to be worthless. the battle is dictated by a series of lunges, missile volleys and flanking maneuvers. standing line-to-line and just firing 100% accurate laser weapons at something doesn't matter unless you significantly outnumber the enemy, in which case you'd be better served by launching missiles or firing medium-range ballistic weapons like heavy mauler or HVD.

at least for me anyway, most battles are decided in the first 30 seconds of the meeting engagement, where i can burst down several of their line ships and then slam myself through that, creating a pocket where massed missile / ballistic volleys will quickly destroy everything else. your mileage may vary i guess. for this kind of thing, lasers are useless. i don't think i've mounted a tactical laser to anything since .5x somewhere.

lasers in the current game always seemed superfluous, TBH.

[Thaago]

If you're doing smaller engagements or if you use ships that can kite and flank, then lasers are extremely useful. They aren't that useful for line to line fighting, but are extremely useful in letting your small ships blow out the rear armor/engines of enemy ships without exposing themselves.

They are also extremely good against fighters, something which used to matter and I hope will matter again (at present the extreme accuracy and projectile speed means that a heavy siege gun (mauler) can snipe a maneuvering fighter, which is... weird).

They also let large ships melt smaller threats with impunity. An Eagle with the default 3 Tacs + 3 Gravs can melt any frigate and no amount of maneuvering will save it... if the AI would just focus its fire, which it often does not.

But yes, if you are using missile heavy ships that can just melt enemies on an opening volley (which I'm guessing is mainly from mods, as vanilla only has a few that can do that, and flak/ipdai tac lasers will destroy a heck of a lot of vanilla missiles), then the flanking/outnumber/wear down approach of beams won't seem good.

[Cik]

most of the time i play interstellar imperium, which doesn't need the missiles, though most ships have a reasonable amount anyway. all you have to do is burn up and leverage your insane level 40+ percentile scaling, guns blazing, then once they are near overload fire ASMs, then continue pushing until you are on the enemy's flank (sometimes on both sides) continue shooting. since you are now on their flanks they will have problems engaging you, and since they are now being attacked from two directions their shields will quickly fold. flux isn't a problem, because II is very heavy on the armor.

granted maybe that tilts my perception of tactical lasers; II has sledge guns which are a tactical laser + projectile + hard flux + more range(?) + high anti-armor damage with lots of mounts for them.

it's not as broken as it sounds, but in the current patch ballistics are just way better for lots of reasons. projectile-based weapons are hardly a disadvantage because like you said, high level gunnery implants make them almost perfectly accurate except when shooting at phase teleporter ships, where lasers aren't very useful either.

[AxleMC131]

Oosh. Lots of different playstyles being discussed here. XD Just gonna say, I love beam weapons, but not as frontline offense. Usually if I'm mounting beams (tac laser, graviton beam, etc.) on my ship, it's for supporting fire, and I go for them because they aren't very flux-hungry.

On another note.

On a separate note, I have one of these in my own personal modding files somewhere. It's called a Pulse-Charge torpedo, and technically is an MIRV. Very similar flight characteristics to the Atropos (short range, iffy tracking, but very fast) but when it gets near a target it fires off a single projectile directly at its target, dealing heaps of energy damage and some EMP as well. If I remember correctly, it's 1000 energy and 500 EMP damage for a successful hit. That sound sort of like what you were looking for?

Yeah kind of. is it a large weapon slot?

Nope.  Comes in two small missile mount types: a single missile (2 OP) or double rack (5 OP). You can see a ship of mine mounting three double racks in this image:

Spoiler

The Pulse-Charge Torpedoes are the blue-coloured torpedoes in the middle. (Not the missiles being fired)

[close]

[Megas]

I really want to like beams, but... beams are generally bad or underperforming in Starsector because they hit only for low amounts of soft flux, making them useless to attack most targets.  Even against targets that are vulnerable to beams, other weapons are often better because they kill faster.  With timers that prevent indefinite kiting and stalling, killing speed is important.

Beams are decent against missiles, but with such terrible DPS, Vulcan and Flak beat them by far.  Even IR pulse laser with IPDAI and high skills may be better than beams at times.

Beams are good at murdering fighters, Hounds, and Cerberus, but they are generally less threatening than most.  Few ships can stack enough beams to murder more.

Beams are okay for ships that do not have any better options for energy mounts.  For example, Eagle's turrets are set so far back that some attack that can match the range of your ballistic points and hit for weak damage is better than no damage at all.  (If you use pulse lasers on Eagle, your range is so bad you might as well go all the way for melee with HMGs and Safety Override.)

Weak, long-ranged beams (i.e., tactical laser) are a cheap way to poke the AI and fool it into keeping shields up (and prevent their hard flux from dissipating).  Alex is aware of this exploit and has hinted that may get patched next release.

Ion Beam is very good, because it can pierce shields and knockout stuff.  However, it is such a flux hog that your ship cannot support more than one or two.

HIL is nasty if it is not blocked by shields, but few ships can combine the HIL with another long-range attack that hits for hard flux.

As for the OP, Graviton Laser is like a heavy tactical laser, though not terribly good at it, but it is a bit better if you have the OP to burn.