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[Vanshilar]

Alright let's focus then, from all that I've read in this thread and the thread I made we all more or less agree that Storm Needler and Heph AG are at the bottom of the barrel.

Nah, I agree that Storm Needler is weak, but Heph is pretty good. It's better than both Hellbore and Devastator on a DPS basis, and better than the Devastator on a damage/flux basis (it's about equal with Hellbore on a damage/flux basis). So Heph is a good general-use anti-armor/hull weapon, while Hellbore is a specialist anti-armor weapon if you're up against a station or something (but bad at anti-hull and smaller ships, due to its higher miss rate), and Devastator is for if you want to have the weapon slot serve dual purpose on PD. On my flagship Onslaught I have the forward large as Heph while the side larges are Devastators, since it's expected that I don't need PD on the front (since I have Proximity Charge Launchers, plus can briefly turn on shields for big stuff and let Onslaught armor tank the rest); the Devastators are the only PD.

Storm Needler however is in a sort of awkward spot. The issue is that if the ship has a large ballistic, then it almost certainly has small/ballistics where the small ballistics will do better as anti-shield (especially with Ballistic Rangefinder) since there are no good anti-armor/hull small/medium ballistic weapons, which means the large ballistic naturally tends toward anti-armor/hull instead (plus large ballistics have better hit strength). You also want anti-shield weapons to have equal or longer range than anti-armor/hull weapons. So the Storm Needler is up against both those factors; there's no real "use case" for it where it wouldn't be better to use some other weapon instead, or to switch the anti-shield duty to some other weapon slot.

Mjolnir is already one of the best weapons despite its high flux cost, since it's a good general-purpose weapon. Even though its flux cost is high, its damage/flux ratio is pretty much the same as the Heph or the Hellbore, i.e. so it just depends on what kind of damage you need. If you already have enough other anti-shield weapons, then go Heph; otherwise, go Mjolnir. You can just leave some slots empty if you're at your flux budget.

Gauss is a bit difficult to use, because it's hard to deal enough damage at that range. This means that it's likely that the enemy ship will just back off when they take some shield damage before you can kill them. So it's useful for pushing enemy ships back (or sniping from long range) but not that useful for killing them, which unfortunately is the ultimate goal of battles. And the flux efficiency is pretty bad, so you never quite make up for the flux usage compared with other weapons.

[TauCetiRedGuard]

What if the Heph and Stormneedler were converted to ammo/charge based weapons? It would provide an actual us case for expanded magazines on ballistic weapons and make them significantly different to the rest of the large ballistic options.

[Dri]

What a bizarre thread. You want to buff large ballistics, which is the single best slot after large missiles? Well, be my guest, plenty of my ships have those(and none of the Remnants/Omegas do)

You really think Large Ballistic are clearly winners over Large Energy? I dunno, at this point I'm pretty torn. What weapons and on what ships really make you say "Wowie-zowie, these large ballistic weapons are sooooo good!" We already talked about Heavy Ballistic Integration and how you can't use it for balancing weapons so don't bring that up or factor it in.

The Large Energy all fit the ships they can be used on very well and are quite powerful at this point. Gigacannon and Paladin aside.

[BigBrainEnergy]

I think ballistics are mostly fine. I stand by my suggestions earlier, but overall I'm pretty happy with the balance. The changes I would suggest making, in order of importance, are:

LAC and LDAC change to 35 flux/shot (0.7 efficiency)
LDAC at 0.8 wasn't used but at 0.6 is overtuned, so 0.7 seems good and it makes sense for both of the light autocannons to match up. In testing it feels just right.

HAC change to 90 flux/shot (0.9 efficiency) and halve all recoil stats
I actually think the medium ballistics are fine, except this one. It has lower dps than a heavy needler but more flux/second and horrible accuracy.

Hephy to 100 flux/shot (0.83 efficiency)
Fares poorly when compared against the hellbore or HIL, but with a little flux touch up should be fine. Current 1.0 efficiency is obviously poor against shields due to being HE but is also poor against armour considering hit strength is less than 1/2 of HIL or 1/3 of hellbore.

Storm needler increase to 30 op, reduce refire delay by 50% (up to 1000 dps and 700 flux/second)
Not many vanilla ships want the niche it fills, but that's fine. My only real problem is the hefty cost bites into your hullmod budget which hurts survivability which is essential for this kind of close range build to work. An op reduction would suffice but it seems the design intent is for "needlers" to be premium so why not lean into that and make the storm needler a 30 op monster that fires at the same speed as its smaller cousins, but non-stop. Ok, maybe that's a bit much, but for it to stay premium it needs to offer more. Its efficiency is already as good as it's going to get and you can't change the range or hit strength because it's clearly intended to be consistent with other needlers... although if we're willing to break that rule then 800 range would also be a fine buff. The smaller needlers do get extra range from brf so its not totally unreasonable.

[CapnHector]

Don't know about Lawrence (maybe he has more specific ideas) but I certainly think the Mjolnir would be a good fit on a lot of High Tech ships. Compared to a Plasma Cannon you lose about 1/3 of the dps and flux efficiency is 8% worse, as well as you have 4/5th the hit strength, but in exchange you get EMP damage, -6 OP cost and most importantly 29% more range as well as access to the skill Ballistic Mastery for +10% more damage and range. With the grain of salt that I haven't really played non redacted High Tech past two versions, I think there's a good chance you would put this on Odyssey, Paragon, Radiant, Executor, Apogee, Champion, at least. Conversely putting Plasma Cannon on a Conquest would probably be bad due to -23% range and losing Ballistic Mastery and Onslaught too would have flux trouble. However, I would definitely like to try HIL Conquest, HIL Onslaught, HIL Retribution, basically HIL anything.

So many variables though that you really need to go example by example, but there's also always the question of is the comparison valid when the ships have quite different stats.

[BigBrainEnergy]

Don't know about Lawrence (maybe he has more specific ideas) but I certainly think the Mjolnir would be a good fit on a lot of High Tech ships.

The best way to find out is to try the prometheus mk II because it has hybrid turrets. I found myself using mjolnir + tachyon lance last patch.

[Thaago]

Re: Gauss
I use it all the time. You can make an "artillery" onslaught with 1 gauss, the TPCs and some HVD/maulers (yes it does have the flux to fire them all). It isn't meta vs ordos because the ordos charge in, but its a wonderful design in AI hands vs everything else, if very different than the usual "charge in and murder" style onslaughts. Gauss is the go-to gun on Conquests for me, its just a perfect weapon for them. I've even done some weird things with Gauss on Dominators (often 1x Gauss, 2x Heavy Mauler, 1x Devastator/Hellbore for when the range closes) even though they are even more flux constrained than Onslaughts. Normal Legion can do double gauss if their officer has ordinance, though I prefer the old reliable Mk 9 + Mjolnir combo for them.

[CapnHector]

Don't know about Lawrence (maybe he has more specific ideas) but I certainly think the Mjolnir would be a good fit on a lot of High Tech ships.

The best way to find out is to try the prometheus mk II because it has hybrid turrets. I found myself using mjolnir + tachyon lance last patch.

Not really. Prometheus MkII has low OP, 450 base flux dissipation, a bad shield. An Odyssey which has a comparable role gets +550 base flux dissipation, +60 OP and takes 17% less flux on its shields. Prometheus MkII is a lovable and wonderful unique ship that deserves more love but it's not really representative of high tech ships.

[coldiceEVO]

You are right about too much small PD, but that doesn't mean small energy is lacking or sub standard. That one small energy strike weapon and ion cannon is a good introduction and summary to energy weapon and midline to high tech starting from frigates.

[Grievous69]

Damn this thread really took off. It'd be a pain to quote every single thing I want to reply to so I'll give random thoughts.

On the subject of powercreep, I feel that's almost a wrong word here since powercreep has negative conotations. Starsector uses flux both for weapon fuel and shield hp, so while you might get more time to kill something, that thing is also going to be killed a bit slower than usual. Buffing weapons is not a simple decrease in TTK as with other games, at least non-missile weapons. And higher efficiency of normal weapons keeps missiles in check. If we'd go back to everything having 1.0 efficiency baseline and then bunch of things having even worse efficiency, then you'd have to touch every missile as well. It doesn't hurt to test things out, I just want ships to rely less on skills and hullmods as band aids.

I regularly used LDAC before, 0.8 really wasn't bad, so you can guess my reaction when it dropped to 0.6.

Wonder if any of these HAG fans ever tried fighting a non pirate fleet. Sure it has nice DPS but it gets you killed more often than the enemy. I gave out a simple test to compare the effectiveness against various sim opponents just for a quick look, yet people still come in here saying 480 flux/second is okay for a pea shooter.

Large energies are definitely stronger than large ballistics if we look at respective ships they can be mounted on. You can't just say "oh Plasma Cannon wouldn't be good on a Conquest", well duuh it's got large ballistics, it's not meant to equip those. Like Dri said, you get excited when you loot a Tachyon Lance or Plasma Cannon. What do I get when I lot Storm Needler, Gauss, Mjolnir? "I'll keep this in a storage in case I fly a Conquest" and even then I won't touch the Storm Needler.

There was actually a wacky discussion about this before, not sure if here or on reddit, but I tried changing some mounts for fun. I gave Odyssey large ballistics and tried double Mjolnir (people here really think that's broken). Aaaand it wasn't, it was very very mediocre, you could feel the lack of kinetics. Sure with Sabot Pods you can help with that, but I could just go with Plasma Cannon and HIL/Tachyon then. Storm Needler + HAG was also very underwhelming. Range mismatch was annoying and again I felt like I was losing much power compared to double Plasma Cannon.

Also Gauss on Onslaught is literally worse than TPCs, it might be cool but it's seriously the worst pick for the center large ballistic.

[CapnHector]

Large energies are definitely stronger than large ballistics if we look at respective ships they can be mounted on. You can't just say "oh Plasma Cannon wouldn't be good on a Conquest", well duuh it's got large ballistics, it's not meant to equip those. Like Dri said, you get excited when you loot a Tachyon Lance or Plasma Cannon. What do I get when I lot Storm Needler, Gauss, Mjolnir? "I'll keep this in a storage in case I fly a Conquest" and even then I won't touch the Storm Needler.

I don't understand why the "duuuh", what are you trying to say? High tech ships are not meant to equip ballistics either so does comparing the two have a point or not? If so then surely it makes sense to do it both ways and if not then you can't do it one way only where you argue high tech weapons are better because they are better on high tech ships.

There was actually a wacky discussion about this before, not sure if here or on reddit, but I tried changing some mounts for fun. I gave Odyssey large ballistics and tried double Mjolnir (people here really think that's broken). Aaaand it wasn't, it was very very mediocre, you could feel the lack of kinetics. Sure with Sabot Pods you can help with that, but I could just go with Plasma Cannon and HIL/Tachyon then. Storm Needler + HAG was also very underwhelming. Range mismatch was annoying and again I felt like I was losing much power compared to double Plasma Cannon.

Please describe the tests you did in more detail so it's actually possible to understand the result. What kind of a measure did you use to gauge efficiency, or was it just this doesn't feel good? How was the ship outfitted? Under player control? How did you play it?

For example let's just do a basic test. Here I changed Mjolnir's type to energy in mjolnir.wpn. Let's try a basic Odyssey build. We try this in the sim vs sim Assault Radiant (the 4x APL 1x Plasma 4x Reaper one) under AI control without an officer with Support Doctrine and Reckless AI.


It's a little sketchy

But it's a win with 516 PPT and 1589 hull remaining on the first try.


Now let's try Plasma. Same build and we take the difference from caps.

Well that's not good. Turns out having range advantage on the Radiant was important.

It is a quick loss dealing little damage.


Edit: Just for good measure, same with TL.


This actually does better than the Plasma variant. Much of the damage is actually due to the Radiant erroneously dropping shields and getting TL sniped though, but damage is damage.

It's still a loss and not close. It would probably have been good to be able to deal more hard flux as the TL does basically nothing to the Radiant's shields.

[llama]

On the subject of powercreep, I feel that's almost a wrong word here since powercreep has negative conotations. Starsector uses flux both for weapon fuel and shield hp, so while you might get more time to kill something, that thing is also going to be killed a bit slower than usual. Buffing weapons is not a simple decrease in TTK as with other games, at least non-missile weapons. And higher efficiency of normal weapons keeps missiles in check. If we'd go back to everything having 1.0 efficiency baseline and then bunch of things having even worse efficiency, then you'd have to touch every missile as well. It doesn't hurt to test things out, I just want ships to rely less on skills and hullmods as band aids.

I agree with this: the reason weapons have been trending towards clustering at better than 1.0 efficiency is that 1.0 efficiency actually feels kinda bad. It's a nice round number sure, but you're also paying for them with OP and they're competing with various sources of flux-free missile damage.

[BaBosa]

If weapon efficiency is trending below 1 then that's a sign that shield efficiencies should probably be decreased instead. Though, that sort of systemic change seems like something to do near the 1.0 release.

[Grievous69]

I don't understand why the "duuuh", what are you trying to say? High tech ships are not meant to equip ballistics either so does comparing the two have a point or not? If so then surely it makes sense to do it both ways and if not then you can't do it one way only where you argue high tech weapons are better because they are better on high tech ships.

Because someone saying Plasma Cannon is not good on a low tech ship is like saying grass is green. Low tech ships already can't handle Mjolnirs, how could a Plasma Cannon ever hope to be good there. Plus you know, range disadvantage and damage type. High tech ships with ballistics on the other hand is at least workable, you have enough flux, mount limitations actually matter but you can end up with some cheesy builds.

Man that Odyssey with ballistics test was like a year ago, I don't remember the specifics lol. I was piloting it myself since battlecruiser (don't like AI flying Odyssey). Didn't do any fancy numbers tests, just what feels good, how fast do I kill enemy ships, how quickly do I flux up. Not sure what soloing a Radiant is supposed to tell us here. You can kite the Radiant I guess with 900 range guns. Hell you could solo it with Gauss Cannons without taking damage, but what's the point of that? We're not talking about kite potential, but pure effectiveness of large weapons.

I'm sure I'll get harassed beyond reason again for operating on "feels" but look at this example. I say dual Mjolnirs won't outperform dual Plasma. And what does the other person do? Tests the build against the strongest brawler in the game, naturally Plasma Cannons won't have a fun time versus a Radiant, a battlecruiser isn't meant to solo a Radiant. Naturally the build has cheese PCLs to mitigate Mjolnir's weakness against heavy armour and you can just stunlock the ship since dual Sarissas means you don't care about kinetic efficiency on Mjolnirs. I could also make the best possible build for my argument and then post numbers but that's manipulating data, which is why I don't do it in the first place. This is a game forum, not an Excel sheet.

It's the same as saying Gauss Cannon is better than MkIX because Conquest can solo ships with Gauss kite. Alright, we discovered hot water *thumbs up*. We just circle back to the argument that low tech ships can't use half of the large ballistic weapons reasonably except one or two exceptions where one ship is midline. None of the other weapon types and sizes have that issue. Medium energies were kind of in a similar place, but they got fixed.

@BaBosa
If we buff all weapons, then buff all shields, what did we do actually? Maybe screw over Shield shunt builds even more, but that's it. If anything the game has too much of a focus on shield damage, I blame the current end game for that. Then we get to discussions where soloing Radiants is suddenly a prerequisite.

[CapnHector]

I'm sure I'll get harassed beyond reason again for operating on "feels" but look at this example. I say dual Mjolnirs won't outperform dual Plasma. And what does the other person do? Tests the build against the strongest brawler in the game, naturally Plasma Cannons won't have a fun time versus a Radiant, a battlecruiser isn't meant to solo a Radiant. Naturally the build has cheese PCLs to mitigate Mjolnir's weakness against heavy armour and you can just stunlock the ship since dual Sarissas means you don't care about kinetic efficiency on Mjolnirs. I could also make the best possible build for my argument and then post numbers but that's manipulating data, which is why I don't do it in the first place. This is a game forum, not an Excel sheet.

You're allowed to discuss feels but I'm also allowed to do testing and I think the numbers are more relevant than feels if discussing balance. It's like you can like a car and drive whatever you want but if it's slow and gets poor MPG then that's probably also worth a mention if you're arguing whether it's a good car.

How the ship performs under AI control is also quite relevant, there is only 1 playership and many AI ships so if some weapon is better for the player but not AI that is a pretty restricted definition of better and should be mentioned.

FWIW the Odyssey can't actually "kite" the Radiant since the Radiant can catch up to it with its skimmer, but it can indeed keep the Radiant at high hard flux with the Mjolnir. The range advantage is specifically why I said it's good.

Mjolnir is probably stronger hitting armor than Plasma since it has 4/5th of the hit strength but will also EMP the target which is not insignificant and will keep the Radiant disabled, and that's a real advantage to the weapon. If you are saying your weapon is better but just not for the hardest fights then that's also something worth mentioning don't you think?

I think that was a pretty fair loadout for all the weapons. None of the tested weapons is particularly good vs shields and all will benefit from the Squall and from the PD cover from PCL, what else would you put on the Odyssey? Please go ahead, post your loadout where you think a Plasma is better on the Odyssey than a Mjolnir, and we can test that with numbers if it's a layout for the AI. It's not "manipulating data" if we are actually discussing the weapons to be tested and what setup they should be tested in, it's study design.