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[BigBrainEnergy]

The thumper seems like it's almost good in its niche but I think it still needs a little bit more love. Its supposed to be a good finisher weapon against hull but the hit strength is so low (100 frag) that it gets significantly reduced just by residual armour, but I don't want the hit strength to be too high or it would turn into a problem (looking at you, cryoblaster).

In the past there have been mechanics like gaining a flat bonus to armour for the purposes of damage reduction only, so what about the reverse for thumpers: enemy armour counts as being lower by 25 for the purposes of damage reduction. It would have very little effect on the weapon's armour damage but would make it much better at finishing off decently armoured ships.

For example, a cruiser with 1000 base armour has 50 for damage reduction when stripped, which would then be treated as 25. Anything with 500 armour or lower would be treated as 0 when stripped.

[Igncom1]

Honestly I think the Thumper is supposed to be the 'bad pirate weapon' more then something a proper military would use.

But even then against most easy enemy types like pirate and luddite ships I think it does just fine, it's the harder high tech and elite piloted hegemony ships that it does terribly against.

[Brainwright]

Let’s be clear : the only ships the Thumper is bad against are AI ships with the three skills that boost armor and hull.  They demand super specialized builds and are a drag on balancing combat.

Everything else is fine.  The Thumper should struggle against super heavy armor.

[HUcast]

Yea the thumper is in a really weird place now, all things considered. Against an enemy with even 200 armor and 10 residual it's doing significantly less than it's stated dps, and against anything in the 400+ range even when stripped it's dps falls into heavy mortar range.

 In comparison to the heavy mortar it's far less effective against anything with real armor, but it gains a ton of effect against missiles and fighters while retaining the ability to scare low tech frigates silly. The problem isn't that the thumper is bad, but more that the thumper's greatest niche (punching down at lower tech frigates and light destroyers while also being effective PD), is overshadowed by two factors.

1. Low tech frigates are usually not a high priority on the players mind, and the ones that are will be high tech ones that have an efficient shield to render the thumper moot.
2. The flak cannon is the best PD weapon in the game and right in the same price range, skewing the benefit of taking a thumper for any joint PD work.

It would be very hard to make the thumper more effective against hulls without seriously infringing on the heavy mortar's territory. Over all I think it's a weapon that doesn't have to extend it's usefulness against late game fleets, it's fine to have a weapon made to be good earlier in the game and against lower tech fleets like pirates and luddic path especially earlier on.

Honestly, I think the OP of the thumper should  be reduced to near zero to represent how cheap and easy to clean it is, and that's it. Maybe 2 or even 3 OP, basically a free slot. That would remove the need for it to feel like it needs to be equally as relevant as the flak or mortar.

[FooF]

Thumper is fine for what it is. It can put out a bizarre amount of damage against hull but yes, armor needs to be stripped and shields down. I would call the Thumper "sneaky effective" in the sense that it doesn't do anything on its own very well but in the few use-cases where it shines, it really shines, especially for the OP cost. I don't intentionally make Thumper builds but I have used them on OP-starved ships and don't regret it. I think of them as a finisher more than anything.

[gG_pilot]

The thumper seems like it's almost good in its niche but I think it still needs a little bit more love.

In the past there have been mechanics like gaining a flat bonus to armour for the purposes of damage reduction only, so what about the reverse for thumpers: enemy armour counts as being lower by 25 for the purposes of damage reduction.

Agree some tweak can be nice, but re-add an  obsolete mechanic is not wise.
What about:
- flux 152 > 145
- make bullets fly faster + 20%
- allow Integrated Point Defence work with Thumper "in case of IPD module is  on board, Thumper counts as it would be small slot"

[hydremajor]

Honestly I'd settle for a bit more ammo

give it more ammo so it can bruteforce some damage onto shields through sheer spam

However

I think the Thumper is supposed to be the 'bad pirate weapon'

I'm sorry but NO, that would be the Medium Assault Gun

[Igncom1]

I think the Thumper is supposed to be the 'bad pirate weapon'

I'm sorry but NO, that would be the Medium Assault Gun

Medium assault gun? If you mean the assault chaingun then that is an amazing weapon.

[Grievous69]

I've made this a bit after the patch dropped, because someone kept arguing that Thumpers are still awful weapons.

Spoiler

[close]

Obviously a meme build since in reality you'd have varied damage types and use Thumpers as cheap additional damage. Sim fights don't mean much I know, but my ship has zero skills and s-mods.

EDIT: I also really liked one Thumper on the pirate Eradicator.

[BCS]

The thumper seems like it's almost good in its niche but I think it still needs a little bit more love. Its supposed to be a good finisher weapon against hull but the hit strength is so low (100 frag) that it gets significantly reduced just by residual armour

You need 2,000 base armor to reduce Thumper damage by 50% using residual armor, no?

[Amoebka]

You need 2,000 base armor to reduce Thumper damage by 50% using residual armor, no?

2000 base armor (100 residual) reduces Thumper damage to just 20% of the stated value.
You need just 500 base armor to take half damage from Thumpers even when fully exposed. Some frigates have that much without hullmods/skills.

[Retry]

I just have to say, an Onslaught bullying 2 Light Cruisers and then promptly getting itself killed fighting a Conquest does not strike me as a ringing endorsement.

[SafariJohn]

He flew into the Conquest on purpose because it was funny

[BCS]

2000 base armor (100 residual) reduces Thumper damage to just 20% of the stated value.
You need just 500 base armor to take half damage from Thumpers even when fully exposed. Some frigates have that much without hullmods/skills.

I thought residual armor didn't count as armor for the puprose of damage types.

[Vanshilar]

I thought residual armor didn't count as armor for the puprose of damage types.

The way residual armor works is that once armor is gone and the weapon is hitting hull, then for the purposes of damage reduction the weapon counts as hitting 5% of the base armor rating. Damage types still apply here, i.e. kinetic will have their hit strength cut in half, high explosive will have their hit strength doubled, and fragmentation have their hit strength reduced to 25%, for that damage reduction calculation. So the hull damage gets multiplied by weapon_hit_str/(weapon_hit_str + 0.05 * base armor rating), with the weapon hit strength affected by those above values. Yes so weapons will always count as if they're trying to hit armor in terms of damage reduction, whether they are hitting armor or hull.

So yes, most frag weapons will still suck against hull. The exceptions are 1) a particular [SUPER REDACTED] weapon because of its obscenely high per-shot damage (one of the best weapons in the game), and 2) surprisingly, vulcan cannon, just because its base damage (500 DPS) is so high that even after being reduced to the minimum of 15%, it still means 75 guaranteed DPS for 20 flux per second. Too bad its range is so short. I keep dreaming of flying a mass vulcan SO flagship to goof off with but...bleh, probably wouldn't work out.