Fractal Softworks Forum
Starsector => Suggestions => Topic started by: SonnaBanana on June 09, 2022, 03:41:29 AM
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Otherwise IR Autolance will be all-around better even if it costs more OP.
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Sadly there are alredy weapons that are never used since many versions, and they never got buffed. Thumper for example.
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Sadly there are alredy weapons that are never used since many versions, and they never got buffed. Thumper for example.
Literally the latest patch had Thumper buffed and now it's actually strong. Do people not even notice the patch notes and in game stats? To this day I see so often people claim Thumper is weak and should get buffed.
As for the topic, yes, HBL is too expensive for what it does, Autolance is already confirmed to be a cheaper option. And even with a cheaper HBL I doubt anything will change. You just don't use mediums mounts for PD duty when every ship has lots of small mounts, mediums are needed for actual firepower. Honestly I think it needs a rework, being just a Burst PD with more charges is sad.
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Basically 100% on-board with Grievous69 here.
Medium Energies are too valuable to mount with a good-not-great PD option. Even if HBL was an elite PD option, it's the same issue you have with the Paladin: great PD but it takes up a Large Energy that can do real damage.
Here's my thought: keep the whole beam/charges identity but it can track/shoot 3 independent targets at once. Beams can't converge on single targets but neither does it eat a charge. Charges are refilled in clip-fashion of 2 every 2 seconds. Max charges raised to 10. It can shoot at a ship and other missiles/fighters simultaneously, if it has charges. For the purpose of firing arcs, the ancillary beams can shoot up to 45 degrees off-center. (Re-name "Trident Burst Laser" :D) Against single targets, its sustained damage isn't stellar but it's twice that of current (146 DPS) and at max charges, it can actually do a fair bit of burst damage. Expanded Magazines really boosts burst and PD-potential.
Overall, it becomes more of a hybrid weapon: Elite PD that doubles as a good-not-great generalist weapon.
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That seems good, and immediately I see myself using it in 2 medium energies on Conquest, instead of having Burst PDs all around. Which I think is how things should work ideally, if you're willing to sacrifice a larger mount for a PD weapon, that weapon should be much better compared to small mount spam.
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The only reason I use medium over small is +100 range. The anti-decoy feature is barely relevant.
I use Heavy Burst Laser primarily as a long-range anti-armor beam with +200 range more than Phase Lance when I have an ePD officer. It is not quite strong enough for the job, but it is the only option when nothing else with better anti-armor has sufficient range or when Phase Lance is too inefficient or flux hungry; too low sustained DPS, does not shoot fast enough. The only reason I use Heavy Burst Laser for assault is Graviton Beam, LR PD Laser, and Tactical Laser are even weaker at anti-armor.
I like to see Heavy Burst Laser getting better sustained DPS, or at least strong enough to shoot down missiles in one shot that takes two for small burst PD.
I have used kinetic and burst PD ships, and they are effective against human fleets. However, they are slow killers, and slow killers are no good against Ordos who outnumber and overpower weaker ships.
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That seems good, and immediately I see myself using it in 2 medium energies on Conquest, instead of having Burst PDs all around. Which I think is how things should work ideally, if you're willing to sacrifice a larger mount for a PD weapon, that weapon should be much better compared to small mount spam.
Most definitely. The main comparison being a flack compared to a vulcan.
Vulcan, 500 DPS(kind of), 250 range 4 OP
Flack 200 DPS (AoE!), 500 range!, 8 OP
But if we compare a HBL to a Burst PD (which isn't even that great a small PD mount!) we get
BPD 214/64 DPS, 500 range, 7 OP
HBL 244/74 DPS, 600 range, 11 OP
We barely get any extra range, we barely get any extra DPS, we don't get any AoE. But additionally we have to start competing with "for real ship killers" like heavy blasters
If HBL was AoE. Able to target three independent targets at once, but not able to stack that damage onto a single target. It would be far better. Granted, making that happen might be very difficult in terms of creating the weapon
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As an addition to the above information, HBLs carry 5 charges to the BPD's 3, so they can maintain their higher DPS for a bit longer. Its not enough IMO to make them worth it, but it raises their alpha strike vs fighters to 882 damage (they get a recharge during the firing, with another charge coming in .4 seconds for 1029) vs the burst pd's 384 (with a 4th shot for 512 .2 seconds delayed). So for non-saturation situations the HBL does carry a more 'in the tank' than a burst pd, but the sustained DPS not being very improved is painful.
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What if instead of giving the H. Burst more firepower, it didn't 'overkill' things?
Give the weapon a feedback 'sense' (like a battery charge circuit), so it knows if the target it hits doesn't use a full charge worth of damage.
One shot uses 1 ammo if it hits but doesn't kill the target. If the shot hits and kills the target, any weapon damage in excess of the targets HP is returned to the weapon as a fractional charge.
That way it's no better than current for attacking ships, but it could shoot multiple missiles on a single ammo charge.
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It could be a bit better for attacking ships. I do not notice a power difference between it and small burst PD. The only differences I notice is more range, more charges, and ignores decoys. It could use a bit more damage or faster recharge.
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Wait. IR autolance will be point defense? I thought It will be more like the gravitron beam.
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I don't think IR autolance will be point defense but it is apparently very good vs fighters.
For attacking ships, I don't think either of the burst PDs are meant to do so as a primary role. Their decent anti-armor makes them better than usual against fighters and acceptable for 'plinking' hull damage at reasonable efficiency, but their low DPS means they are never doing to be 'good'.
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I don't think IR autolance will be point defense but it is apparently very good vs fighters.
Then I dont think it really competes for the HBLs niche. Really good aganist figter may be good accuarcy but only somewhat good turnspeed.
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My impression is that the IR autolance is basically meant to let Midline ships "leave medium energies empty except not really" by having them contribute some paltry shield/armor damage with the slightly niche use of deleting fighters and sizzling through naked hull. It's for ships that struggle for flux if they fill their medium energies with conventional, flux-inefficient weapons; and probably of limited use on high tech ships that have flux to spare.
Regarding the HBL, I honestly agree that it doesn't need to exist. It's just a bigger Burst PD, hell even its sprite is almost just an upsized copy. I would love for HBL to go and be replaced with another more conventional energy weapon.
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Hopefully, IR Autolance will do more than zapping fighters. It had better rip through hull fast and vaporize ships like Thumper or Cryoblaster does to make up for poor anti-armor.
I have left small energy mounts empty on Falcon and Eagle to use Heavy Burst Lasers in the medium mounts. Also, if I do not use burst laser spam with ePD, I may use ePD IR PL or Ion Cannon in the smalls and use HBL for PD in the mediums.
I use HBL in the rear medium mount on Brilliant (plus burst PD in the smalls). Brilliant has weird mounts like Apogee, and next release, it will lose flares and its fighter bay, so PD will be even harder.
And HBL is useful for ships that want to use burst PD but cannot because the mount they want to use it on is a synergy (e.g., Aurora).
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About Thumper. I played with it a bit tried it on falcon and other midline ships (I really dont see it working on lowtech), but i could not get results that would not be overshadoved by other ballistic options.
Megas do you have any builds that make good use of thumper?
HBL is good point defense on some mod dreadnoughts that have energy mounts. It is also good on brilliant as you said. I think it is fine now the is just not much ship that would use it.
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I would not recommend Thumpers on Enforcers: they flux themselves out on it. I actually find the Thumper to be decent substitute for the Assault Chaingun. Yes, you need another way to get through armor but the ACG really isn’t even good at that and I just like the raw DPS for hull.
HBL, as it is, is too much of a trap: it takes a valuable Medium Energy, isn’t a great PD option for 11 OP, and doesn’t do appreciable damage to anything else. Maybe the best fix is reduce the cost of BPD and HBD to 5 and 8, respectively, so you don’t expect too much from them.
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The impression I'm getting here is that it would be easier for devs to create a new useful high tech ship with built-in HBL as an extra than to make HBL worth taking on its own.
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I do not use Thumper because either I need the mounts for (mostly) anti-shield and (some) anti-armor, or Thumper does not have enough range. It is more like my ships have been cut down by Thumper when used by the enemy, usually when I test Vanguard or other small ships against SIM Enforcers, pirate ships, and the like.
HBL, as it is, is too much of a trap: it takes a valuable Medium Energy, isn’t a great PD option for 11 OP, and doesn’t do appreciable damage to anything else. Maybe the best fix is reduce the cost of BPD and HBD to 5 and 8, respectively, so you don’t expect too much from them.
While I would love the OP reduction, I do not see that happening when even weaker (LR) PD Lasers cost 4 or 5 OP as they are. Burst PD is much better than those two. Also, burst PD does not need IPDAI to track like small ballistic PD do. Then again, I use IPDAI much on several ships either to make Vulcans track reliably enough or to exploit the elite Point Defense skill and turn small weapons into long-range assault weapons (with PD being a welcome bonus).
Heavy Burst Laser is okay as an assault weapon on the likes of Medusa, where enemies happily flux themselves out with more inefficient weapons, then Medusa wears them down with Railguns and burst laser spam. Unfortunately, that does not work on Ordos, where defense and slow kills is not an option.
As a PD option, it is the only PD option for medium-sized energy (aside from Omega's Rift Beam). There ought to be a PD option.
The impression I'm getting here is that it would be easier for devs to create a new useful high tech ship with built-in HBL as an extra than to make HBL worth taking on its own.
I use HBL primarily on midline ships. Occasionally on high-tech. If I used Venture, I probably want to use HBL for PD and HVD/Mauler in ballistics. I do not want to try to beat down enemies with a mining/heavy blaster given their inefficiency.
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I think the energy pd line could be:
pd laser: 3 OP
lrpd: 3 OP
burst pd: 5 OP
heavy burst pd: 7 OP
Perhaps that is a bit too cheap! But if I'm thinking about what a trio of vulcans can do for point defense vs a trio of pd lasers (wolf vs lasher for example), or what a flak vs a heavy burst pd does it seems reasonable.
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I think the energy pd line could be:
pd laser: 3 OP
lrpd: 3 OP
burst pd: 5 OP
heavy burst pd: 7 OP
Perhaps that is a bit too cheap! But if I'm thinking about what a trio of vulcans can do for point defense vs a trio of pd lasers (wolf vs lasher for example), or what a flak vs a heavy burst pd does it seems reasonable.
Honestly, this is probably the best solution. PD lasers are mediocre under ideal conditions and should no way cost as much as Vulcans. I don’t even think burst PD is anywhere near Vulcans and yet they’re a almost twice as expensive. I know this has been brought up before but what’s the rationale for BPD/HBPD being so expensive? I get that high tech doesn’t need to have as good of PD relative to Low Tech but I can’t recall why OP prices are so high for mediocre PD.
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I think the performance of burst pd is pretty good, and better in some ways than a vulcan. They have range to destroy sabots before they enter second stage, circling missiles like Salamanders, or missiles targeted at other ships. They also have alpha strike to kill fighters before they can fire (if there are several burst PDs). It comes at the cost of their sustained effectiveness vs saturation being significantly worse, but that to me is a legitimate tradeoff.
For example, on some of my Falcon builds I'll put 4 burst PD on and their in battle PD performance is very solid, reliably killing many missiles and fighters in a big area. 28 OP is really painful though - absolutely paying a premium to have effective PD.
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I'd guess the theory behind energy PD being more expensive is that multiple ships are more likely to be able to focus fire with them, enhancing their fleet effectiveness relative to ballistic PD options which tend to only protect the ship they is on.
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But if we compare a HBL to a Burst PD (which isn't even that great a small PD mount!) we get
BPD 214/64 DPS, 500 range, 7 OP
HBL 244/74 DPS, 600 range, 11 OP
HBLs carry 5 charges to the BPD's 3, so they can maintain their higher DPS for a bit longer. Its not enough IMO to make them worth it, but it raises their alpha strike vs fighters to 882 damage (they get a recharge during the firing, with another charge coming in .4 seconds for 1029) vs the burst pd's 384 (with a 4th shot for 512 .2 seconds delayed). So for non-saturation situations the HBL does carry a more 'in the tank'
I would see the word "Burst" as the most important functionality of the weapon system. So sustained fire is intended to be low.
Therefore buff up number of charges from 5 to 7.
On top consider some of these:
a] lower OP from 11 to 10
b] make sure that it has dmg per shot high enough to one-hit-kill any rocket(include torpedoes, but without ECM). Information in the weapon description, that "this PD greatly reduce torpedo danger by one-hit-kill capability" would make it worth consider for certain ships. Also make sure this PD has "improved logic to prevent overkill" so it selects first torpedos, then rockets based on their current HP, then bombers, then fighters, then charging, if NO_CHARGES>1/2 of MAX_CHARGES then shoot anyhing else