Burst damage is usually a desirable characteristic for causing overload though.
I wasn't talking about the flux inflicted on a shielded target, I was talking about the flux required to fire the weapon, specifically in response to Megas's comment that the heavy needler has "cheaper" flux use. Heavy Needlers require the ship firing them to have at least ~600 flux available and have a time-average flux cost of ~169 flux per second whereas Heavy Autocannons require the ship firing them to have at least ~300 flux available to fire and have a time-average flux cost of ~214 flux per second. This is not an improvement, it is a side-grade.
Vs armour I'm not sure which is best overall; HAC will be better against light armour, needler against heavy armour.
Someone should run the numbers to find the exact point they do equal damage.
If by 'equal damage' you mean that Heavy Autocannons and Heavy Needlers have equal DPS under the assumption of a constant armor rating, then there is no such armor rating; Heavy Autocannons have a higher nominal DPS and are less affected by armor than Heavy Needlers, so Heavy Autocannons will have a higher constant-armor DPS than Heavy Needlers will for all possible armor ratings. If by 'equal damage' you mean 'equal damage per shot,' then there is no valid armor rating such that a shot from a Heavy Needler will do the same damage as a shot from a Heavy Autocannon; individual shots from a Heavy Autocannon will always do more damage than individual shots from a Heavy Needler as long as the armor rating is greater than about -16.7, and as armor ratings cannot be less than zero Heavy Autocannon shots will always be more damaging than Heavy Needler shots. If by 'equal damage' you mean 'equal burst damage,' then under the assumption of a constant armor rating there is no valid armor rating such that a burst from a Heavy Autocannon will do as much damage as a burst from a Heavy Needler; the Heavy Needler will always do more burst damage as long as the armor rating is greater than -116.4, and as armor ratings cannot be negative a burst from a Heavy Needler will always do more damage than a burst from a Heavy Autocannon (this is sufficiently negative that it's quite likely that even if you drop the assumption of a constant armor rating for all shots in the burst a Heavy Autocannon will not be able to cause more damage per burst than a Heavy Needler). If by 'equal damage' you mean 'equal time to reduce a given armor value to zero,' then it is possible that there is such an armor value, but it's the Heavy Needlers that are better against light armor and the Heavy Autocannons that are better against heavy (at least, ignoring accuracy issues and assuming only a single weapon is firing), as there are armor values such that Heavy Autocannons will need more than 3 shots (1 burst) and Heavy Needlers will require less than 15 shots (1 burst) to break; one example of such an armor value is 100 - to break an armor rating of 100, a Heavy Autocannon will require 5 shots (1.67 bursts, or about 1.6 seconds of firing) whereas a Heavy Needler will require 13 shots (0.867 bursts, or about 0.9 seconds of firing). I haven't run the numbers for all possible armor values, but it is possible that there are several armor value intervals such that a Heavy Needler will require less time to break armor than a Heavy Autocannon would, though the higher the armor rating the less likely it is that a Heavy Needler will require less time to break that armor than a Heavy Autocannon would because Heavy Needlers have a much longer firing cycle (3.55 seconds) than Heavy Autocannons do (1.4 seconds). The 'equal damage' picture becomes more clouded when you allow accuracy to matter and when you allow multiple weapons (especially mixed weapons).
