Ok so… this is mainly a frigate thing and it’s pretty expensive. But I bet it can work on a Medusa too. And it might even work on an Aurora.
The key here is that there are only like 2 beams that are long enough range for HSA to not be a huge imposition. But also there are some really good small and medium energy flux dumpers at 600 range. It’s very rare you would want 220 dmg Vs shields for 75 flux as opposed to 333 for 300. Or 500 for 720. The extra damage you do will cover the flux cost by preventing the enemy from forming kinetic into your shields. (Usually)
But what if we had some other way to flux dump. And we just wanted to ensure that enemy shields stayed up… while we recharged our burst again…
So How do we use HSA?
We pair ion beams/graviton and antimatter blasters. Ion beams are exceptional disablers and antimatter blasters are exceptional flux dump. The ion beams disable an enemy ship and will eventually overload it after we flux dump. The anti-matter blasters kill things…
This way we get to both flux dump and keep a low overall flux usage and relatively efficient damage.
A medusa is probably best as
Graviton, Ion, 2 AMB + ITU + HSA -> 55 OP which leaves us 45 OP for other things we want. But the Graviton can be a pulsar for extra dump if we have the cap.
Why not ion beams without HSA? Well because we might actually want the reduced range. Both for AI of our ships and for AI of enemy ships. But also because that little chip damage will steadily cook an enemy ship when they might be able to bail otherwise. But we cannot effectively add more burst than dumping almost all our flux with AMB anyway so…adding more guns doesn’t help us. Plus, our AMB have a long cooldown. We do not want to dump AMB into shields and overload a ship just short enough for our AMB to still be on cooldown.
This should also work on a wolf, shrike, and maybe on a tempest. Aurora… maybe. 7 AMB + ITU + ion +2 grav + HSA is… 123 OP of 165… 153 with maxed caps… and barely full dumps in a volley. (And like we can put in missiles too)
