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[Grievous69]

To clear up what I mean. With energy weapons, as you get to larger mount sizes, the weapons get better. Small energies are either support, PD, meh assault options and one strike weapon. Mediums now finally caught up to speed provide similar options but with more variety and stronger punch. And then large energy weapons are the final step where you see the big shots that make the center point of ship builds.

Balistics somehow achieved the total opposite. Thanks to Ballistic Rangefinder and continous buffs, small ballistics became THE ballistic mounts. I don't hate BRF in any way though, I like what it does. It just made it clear how the weapon progression became wonky.

I don't think there's a single bad small ballistic gun. Star of the show is LDAC with 0.6 efficiency which might as well be an exotic weapon with such stats. Accuracy is not a huge issue since they're meant to hit shields and AWM and Gunnery Implants fix that even more. Railguns and small Needlers having 900 range obsoletes the medium options. So you can theoretically end up with small Needlers having MORE range than medium ones, huh? That doesn't seem right to me. So if you can spare the OP (which you usually can by picking small instead of medium weapons) and have enough mounts, it's an easy choice.

Medium ballistics still have strong contenders: HVD, Mauler, Arbalest, Flaks. And that's it. Heavy Autocannon is a direct "upgrade" to LDAC, and suddenly you're paying more to have 1.0 efficiency instead of 0.6. Again wtf moment. Only ever decent on hardpoints. Heavy Mortar is something you get if you don't have Maulers, if there was anything else even slightly decent similar to it, it wouldn't exist anymore. Heavy Needler is too expensive and 700 range. It seems mid range options got the biggest middle finger.

Then we get to large ballistics where the situation is almost worse than with mediums, almost. Hellbore and MkIX are good budget options doing their job. I can at least stomach MkIX having 1.0 efficiency because it deals good damage to hull and it has good alpha. Devastator is nice for ships that can get in range and has additional use as anti fighter. Then we get to really niche options with Mjolnir, HAG and Gauss. Neither is horrible or anything. They just can't be reasonably fitted on most ships with large ballistics, until you do heavy sacrificing. And all require Ordnance Expertise. Lastly, Storm Needler is a joke which got attention in another thread and made me make this one in addition.

My thoughts in short: LDAC is too efficient. HAC shouldn't have 1.0 efficiency if it's ever going to try and compete with smalls, Heavy Needler needs 800 range at least. Heavy Mortar is annoying because you don't have options apart from Maulers, and I don't like being forced to use them. Again, I really wish we had a 800 range HE gun, just to see who'll still use Heavy Mortar.

Large ballistics are more delicate because it's easy to make them broken with Ordance Expertise, it feels like that skill was implemented as a band aid for low tech ships that want to use large ballistics. I can't imagine not running it on some ships nowadays. Also good ol' Heavy Ballistics Integration reminds us "hey, you'll hate it less if you pay 10 OP less". Invictus is the only ship that should have it. I dare be extreme and say to adjusts flux costs and get rid of Ordance Expertise. HAG is too flux hungry no matter how baited we are with accuracy buffs. Mjolnir is good on a single ship in the game. I only ever used Gauss on Atlas MkII. Storm Needler is way too niche, and AI unfriendly.

P.S. To obligatory powercreep comments. We already went and shifted the whole meta picks a few times, some with buffs/nerfs, some with new skills. I'd rather buff a few weapons than nerf everything else. Clearest indication of this issue is a decent chunk of players downsize ballistic mounts. That is a rarity with other mounts, here it is usually an optimization.

[CapnHector]

Agree with just about everything said here based on my .96 testing.

It's mostly the medium ballistics that need a rework as they are utterly uninteresting this version. With the buff to LDAC I find myself thinking "dang, I have to mount a medium ballistic here, if only this were a small mount" when equipping a Medium Hybrid slot or downsizing a Large Ballistic. They have one niche which is extreme range at the cost of efficiency, and that's the two guns - HVD and Mauler. Other purposes are better served by smalls or your ship's other weapons. Usually missiles or Large Ballistics can easily provide the HE you need, so no need to bother with medium or small ballistics for it.

[Axolotl]

Pretty much, but you neglected PD like the HMG or Thumper. You can create fun stuff with them, but not optimal for sure. Maybe the other way around would be better to have higher efficiency in bigger mounts?

[Grievous69]

HMG and Assault Chaingun are SO weapons, I have no comments on those. Thumper is better than before, still not great but doesn't need to be. I definitely don't think bigger mounts should be more efficient, just saying that the differences between small - medium and large are too big. And that some large weapons are made to be so incredibly situational that I'm tired of seeing only MkIX and Hellbores in my fleet.

[BaBosa]

The machine gun line should not be PD. there are always better options and they're more like kinetic assault weapons. LDAC did need a buff because it was *** before but got slightly overturned. An efficiency of 0.65 or 0.7 is probably good.

I think the overall issue is that Alex is trying to have cheap *** weapons for early-game enemies but also wants good budget options for players but also doesn't want to bloat the game with too many weapons, especially without making weapons direct upgrades of each other while having weapons that have different specialties. He probably needs to sit down and do a full review of the weapon set after changing things piecemeal for a while.

[Megas]

LDAC should be similar to LAC.  Either both 600 or 700 range, and efficiency should be close.  Perhaps LAC/DLAC should have 1.0 efficiency like all of the autocannons in heavier mounts.  Then again, people would use ACs less and Railgun/Light Needler more.

Large ballistics are more delicate because it's easy to make them broken with Ordance Expertise, it feels like that skill was implemented as a band aid for low tech ships that want to use large ballistics. I can't imagine not running it on some ships nowadays.

It is also a band-aid for high-tech ships that want to use blasters or more than a couple pulse lasers.  As for getting rid of it, not if it makes Industry more of a joke for those who do not use Leadership and Derelict Ops. combo.

HMG and Assault Chaingun are SO weapons, I have no comments on those. Thumper is better than before, still not great but doesn't need to be. I definitely don't think bigger mounts should be more efficient, just saying that the differences between small - medium and large are too big. And that some large weapons are made to be so incredibly situational that I'm tired of seeing only MkIX and Hellbores in my fleet.

With ePD and Ballistic Mastery, HMG has enough range to compete with the likes of normal assault weapons.  Of course, ePD is a significant opportunity cost.

Assault Chaingun is an option for Retribution, who gets so close to enemies with Orion Drive (and cannot use SO).

[CapnHector]

HMG was pretty poor in my testing even with ships that get to point blank range with the enemy (Venture LP, also see that thread in my sig for detailed results if you want). Admittedly it was at a higher speed multiplier which might affect it but it was even much worse than Heavy Needler which would be similarly affected. The AI probably wastes the shots by using it for PD, I also notice the AI behaves worse with it by trying to retreat and shoot down missiles instead of tanking them and pressing the assault, which aggressive ships need to do. Assault Chaingun might be good but has a terrible flux cost, I am not going to use 400 flux per second (one third of my flux dissipation on the Retribution even with maxed vents if no Ordnance Expertise) on a short range HE gun when I already have a better one in the Devastator. Obviously a staple of SO though, in fact probably a significant part of why SO is good on smaller ship by itself - these comments concern non-SO builds.

Thumper doesn't exist. Why does the HMG have a PD tag and this one doesn't. As is it is a short range version of the IR autolance with 2/5th the hit strength and in a much more valuable slot than a medium energy. IR autolance is worth 8 OP, so maybe this is worth 3 OP?

PD is a scam, you win this game by destroying the enemy, not the enemy's missiles. Flak is just a bad use of a ballistic slot. You can defend better using Converted Hangar + fighters, Devastators and PCLs while also dealing serious damage to the enemy while doing so.

My two cents about the ones Grievous didn't mention. Don't see myself putting any of these on my Retributions or Venture LPs despite those being knife fighting ships due to poor performance from the HMG and flux costs for Assault Chaingun.

[Grievous69]

I mean I also didn't have either Assault Chainguns or HMGs on Retribution, prefered other setups. But I see people running that and having success so it can't be that bad. At least the HMG + Devastators combo.

[Megas]

I used Chaingun on Retribution because I Shield Shunted mine (mainly so AI does not retreat when flux gets high from blocking stuff with shield) and did not care about flux neutrality.  I used chainguns (replacing two machineguns with them) when they killed a bit faster than just Devastators and kinetics.

[CapnHector]

I mean I also didn't have either Assault Chainguns or HMGs on Retribution, prefered other setups. But I see people running that and having success so it can't be that bad. At least the HMG + Devastators combo.

I also see people complaining Retribution isn't strong or only works as a playership. Really HMG can only be good on it if you are filling all the shots because you could be firing 2x LDAC for just a little less DPS that the AI doesn't waste on PD and with 800 instead of 450 range. It was unequivocally weaker on the Venture LP in systematic testing than just putting a LDAC in the slot and that ship behaves very similarly to the Retribution. But I'll be sure to test this one, I want to do some Retribution science, so watch this space. Another test I want to do is swap 1 of the Devastators for Storm Needler, might actually be good on that ship since it'll range match hindmost LDACs roughly.

[Thaago]

I agree with some of your points and disagree with others.

For LDAC: Yup, it is too efficient now. Even with upgrades the shots do miss, and are shorter range, but they don't miss that much. Nerfing LDAC to .8 or .75 would work imo. That said, I still get better performance with the 'elite' guns than this, as their other qualities make them better (and also more expensive).

For Ballistic Rangefinder: It is expensive and there are few ships which mount it to good effect - and even on those ships it is not mandatory - so I don't think it is quite right to 'bake in' its range boost when discussing small ballistics overall. It is a good choice on a Dominator if either forgoing frontal PD or relegating it to the medium mounts, and maybe on the Legion for the same (but that entails losing missile firepower). Using it on an Onslaught is similarly questionable as there are only 6 small mounts and they have poor convergence. Are there any other good candidates for it? I could just be blanking, but large ballistics are rare and the conquest doesn't have small ballistic mounts.

So, I really disagree with 'railgun + light needler have 900 range'. They do on a small set of ships where the build is setting aside 15 (for cruisers) or 25 (for capitals) extra OP to give them that boost, and using an inverted mount scheme to put PD on other slots. Or downgrading medium to small slots, which lowers a ship's offensive potential but can be made to work.

For mid range, it's funny because I think both heavy needler and heavy mortar are good weapons! The needler is just an upsize of the light, so can be swapped there if the slots work (they sometimes do, they sometimes don't). It's high DPS/slot, high efficiency, alpha burst, and range matching with the heavy mortar are nice.

For the heavy mortar, if the accuracy can be overcome (which as you argue for the LDAC it can be) it has good stats. Not as crazy as the LDAC, but .82 FPD at 110 HE shot size (220 vs armor), 220 dps, all for 7 OP. I think heavy maulers with their 1000 range are good guns, but for comparison they have 1.0 FPD, 120 DPS, 200 HE shot size, for 12 OP. If a ship's plan is to fight in the 'mid-close' rangeband, mortars are much better than maulers.

For the HAC: I feel that the railgun/needler/HAC line were fairly balanced before because of the OP costs, range, etc, so I would argue for the LDAC to receive a nerf rather than this gun receive a buff. I use this weapon and think it is ok. It has significant DPS advantages over the HVD, and is significantly cheaper than the heavy needler.

I have uses/builds for all the current large ballistic guns, though a few notes:
I agree with you on Mk IX and Hellbore. They are cheap, they get their jobs done. I think the hellbore is somewhat overated in how people talk about it, because its slow projectile misses a lot. Great at busting big ships armor though.
Haephestus: Better than people give it credit for, but 480 is a lot of flux to dedicate to HE. I feel like this has the stats of 2 perfect medium mount HE guns (with 100 more range) stapled together, which is not always what I'm looking for in a large mount.
Gauss: Unrivalled range and shot size - smaller ships can't afford to get hit at all by this, their armor can't take it even though it is kinetic. Fantastic on ships built to use it. The main issue is that current endgame enemies charge into close range, and only 1 ship (conquest) can both mount this and also kite them. I'll use this on conquests all game, and on onslaughts, legions, and dominators for everything but ordo hunting (and it does work on onslaughts there, but is just not as good as other guns because the ordos charge).
Mjolnir: slightly too flux expensive, but otoh it allows for a kinetic ship to have 'decent' anti-armor while sacrificing less shield efficiency to do so than mounting an HE weapon. On a legion for example I will go Mjolnir+Mk IX as the only guns and it does well. I've experimented with this on Onslaught side mounts as well, and it does good in swatting flankers or letting me broadside, though it is a bit expensive and onslaughts have enough mounts that mixing in some HE is not prohibitive. Same for Conquests, it lets them not have HE.
Storm Needler: specialist anti-shield and great at it - .7 efficiency and 500 dps. Replacing it with smaller slots does not always work, depending on mount layout. Really shines as the center mount of an onslaught vs ordos.

[CapnHector]

You should try BRF setups if you think they somehow don't work. For example putting 5x LDAC + BRF on an Enforcer gets you 713 kinetic DPS for 35 OP and 430 flux / sec at 700 range. Compare to 3 Heavy Needlers for 750 dps for 45 OP and 600 flux / sec. If you're thinking "but I need those slots for flak", 1) you don't and 2) this setup lets you put in a converted hangar with the OP saved, and Sarissa. Add Breach to deal with armor. Last version 5x Railgun BRF Breach Enforcer was excellent, routinely pulling several times its own weight vs Ordos according to combat reports. Better than for example HVD Mauler.

On an Onslaught if you put in the 6x Railgun you are getting 1002 kinetic damage per second at 900 range with perfect accuracy and 900 flux/s for 67 OP including the cost of BRF. By contrast putting 4 HVDs you would get 552 kinetic dps at 1000 range at 700 flux/s for 52 OP. That's much better than an extra free Heavy Needler with 900 range.

Here are some ships on which I know a BRF small ballistic setup is good:
Retribution (and really the only way to go with this ship that I can see), Onslaught, Dominator, Enforcer, Manticore. On the Venture LP small ballistic was better even without BRF so I think it also goes here.

Here are some I think it's good on:
Eradicator, all Venture flavors.

That's basically the whole low tech lineup of fighting ships.

[BigBrainEnergy]

LDAC efficiency is definitely overtuned, but I still find myself often choosing railguns due to the massive difference in accuracy. For example, the best way to use a lasher right now is 2 LDACS in the hardpoints and a railgun in the front turret. With that said, I think the best thing to do would be to give both the single and double LAC 0.7 efficiency.

Heavy AC could use some recoil reduction and 0.9 efficiency. Right now the smaller ballistics almost all have better efficiency than the larger options so it's a bit weird for the heavy AC to have the same efficiency as the mark IX.

For the large ballistics I think they fill niches that don't exist or are at least very rare in vanilla. Most large ballistics ships don't have the spare flux to mount anything beyond the cheapest options. For ships that can actually make use of the expensive options they perform well, it's just rarely even an option when they push low-tech flux grids beyond their limits.

[Grievous69]

LDAC efficiency is definitely overtuned, but I still find myself often choosing railguns due to the massive difference in accuracy. For example, the best way to use a lasher right now is 2 LDACS in the hardpoints and a railgun in the front turret. With that said, I think the best thing to do would be to give both the single and double LAC 0.7 efficiency.

Heavy AC could use some recoil reduction and 0.9 efficiency. Right now the smaller ballistics almost all have better efficiency than the larger options so it's a bit weird for the heavy AC to have the same efficiency as the mark IX.

For the large ballistics I think they fill niches that don't exist or are at least very rare in vanilla. Most large ballistics ships don't have the spare flux to mount anything beyond the cheapest options. For ships that can actually make use of the expensive options they perform well, it's just rarely even an option when they push low-tech flux grids beyond their limits.

I'll qoute everything you said because you proposed interesting changes. LDAC and LAC really should be the same since one trades less range and accuracy for more DPS.

If Conquest didn't exist, all these "exotic" large ballistics would barely see any use.

[CapnHector]

@Thaago, to continue on the topic of the Onslaught and to give a concrete example of the BRF way of thinking, try a build like this and tell me what you think compared to your Storm Needler build.


(The fighter is Sarissa)

You can pit this ship just out of the box vs 2 sim Radiants (Strike and Assault variants) in a full frontal assault under AI control with no orders and it will win cleanly and directly. No S-mods needed. Let me emphasize that the Radiants carry Sabots and the other one has 4x Typhoon Reapers because I think worrying about PD and spamming flak is the #1 way people ruin their ships. It's fine with the Devastators, fighters and PCLs. Of course if you put S-mods on this ship (say BRF and RB) you will have 55 more OP to play with and can basically put in whatever you want.