Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[mr. domain]

Inspired by an observation by BigBrainEnergy in one of my suggestion threads: https://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=29633.msg434565#msg434565

What is your opinion of the IR Pulse Laser? Does it deserve a buff in flux efficiency? Is it good as it is? Are there any other stats that you think should be buffed for it? Do you have any loadouts putting it to good use?

[Grievous69]

I put 2 on my Scarabs alongside an AMB. And in rare circumstances where I can't for the life of me find a decent medium energy, then I use them to help with shield damage on ships like Fury, Shrike, Aurora, etc.

But as I said in that thread, if you've got larger weapons that aren't missiles, you'll probably end up using those for assault. Smalls end up being left for PD duty or support. And it's impossible to compete with AMB for damage.

[Amoebka]

They are fine, I use them regularly. It could be buffed, or it could stay the same. Either way, the weapon has a niche it's used in, and won't become a default choice for every ship unless you quadruple the damage or something silly like that.

If you halve the flux cost, I will still use them on the same ships I use them on now, and still won't start using them on other ships.

[Wyvern]

The IR Pulse Laser is, for what it is, actually really good.

...It's just that what it is, is the middle-of-the-line balance-point weapon for the small energy slot, and there are very few hulls that need general-purpose firepower out of a small energy weapon. Still, I use two of them on my default Aurora fit, and they do good work there.

So I don't think the weapon really needs a buff. Could it use a few more ships where it works well? Yeah, probably. But I'm not entirely sure what those hypothetical ships would look like. Maybe something kindof like the shrike but with a more general-purpose mobility system and extra small turrets instead of the medium? Maybe? I dunno.

[Thaago]

A small cheap gun for shooting at small targets. 50 hit strength means that vs bigger things they act more like terrible kinetics than energy, but for some ships terrible kinetics is still a good choice. I use them on frigates and on some shrike builds and think they do ok.

[Selfcontrol]

They are fine.

[Grievous69]

Could it use a few more ships where it works well? Yeah, probably. But I'm not entirely sure what those hypothetical ships would look like. Maybe something kindof like the shrike but with a more general-purpose mobility system and extra small turrets instead of the medium? Maybe? I dunno.

Just spitballin a quick idea even if it's not super related to the thread.

Something with a similar setup of the Odyssey could see use of IR Pulse Lasers, Gigacannons and Paladins. So bunch of small energy mounts, zero mediums and then a couple of large energies so that it makes low flux weapons more desirable.

Odyssey is seriously nice with a bunch of IR Pulse Lasers but it kinda switched to a semi-missile ship with a few changes. Switched large energy to synergy, removed the tight convergence point, much more speed potential but also weaker shields. It wants to use missiles. And it also has fighters. So something without all of those boons should be ideally motivated to have a unique setup of weapons.

And for the love of god please no more "move only forward" ship systems, half ot the roster has that ability.

Back to the main topic now: IR Pulse Lasers have good DPS for their size but horrible damage per shot, you know what's the complete opposite? It's Gigacannon, bingo! Match made in heaven yet there isn't a single ship where this loadout makes sense.

[Amoebka]

So bunch of small energy mounts, zero mediums and then a couple of large energies so that it makes low flux weapons more desirable.

This is actually the exact list of requirements for IR pulse to NOT be good, because it gets outcompeted by HSA tac lasers, just like it does on Odyssey.

The main use case is ships like Fury/Aurora. So 1-2 mediums, no larges, and a small amount of smalls. You tend to rely on heavy blaster for primary damage on ships like these, and IR pulses pair nicely with it, providing better flux efficiency against shields and anti-fighter coverage.

If a ship has a lot of mediums, you use one of them for anti-fighter and don't need IR pulses. If a ship has a lot of smalls, tac lasers become more efficient.

[Grievous69]

I pretty much never use Tac Laser, and why would I spend so much OP just to have an IR Pulse Laser but colored green...

EDIT: Guess it becomes better when your fleet synergizes around beam spam, but that playstyle is mindnumbingly boring to me.

[Amoebka]

The OP cost of the hullmod is offset by the fact that tac lasers are 4 OP, while IR pulses are 5. With enough small slots you barely pay anything extra.

HSA tac lasers have better range and better flux efficiency. The difference is significant. The downside is lower DPS/slot, but with so many small slots it becomes irrelevant.

[Phenir]

The OP cost of the hullmod is offset by the fact that tac lasers are 4 OP, while IR pulses are 5. With enough small slots you barely pay anything extra.

HSA tac lasers have better range and better flux efficiency. The difference is significant. The downside is lower DPS/slot, but with so many small slots it becomes irrelevant.

You'd need to be mounting a lot of smalls for tac laser reduced op cost to pay for hsa.
Pulse lasers have almost twice the dps of hsa tac lasers. Even with like 6 smalls (odyssey broadside), you'd be choosing between 912 dps vs 495 dps and the tac lasers paid for less than a third of the cost of hsa.

[Megas]

IR PL is okay, if not great.  The only buff for IRPL I like to see is for it to be moved to the basic BP pack like Pulse Laser was and made available in Open Market if a low-budget energy bolt weapon (like fighters' high-delay IRPL) will not be added.  Mining Laser as the only basic small energy option is underwhelming.

HSA tac lasers have better range and better flux efficiency. The difference is significant. The downside is lower DPS/slot, but with so many small slots it becomes irrelevant.

One advantage IRPL has over HSA Tac Lasers is not having HSA does not chop the range of other beams like various PD or Phase Lance.

I tend to use HSA Tac Lasers only when I want HSA Graviton too.  Even then, I only use that on ships that do not have smod Mags and ePD.  If I get those two things, then HSA burst PD is better.

[Goumindong]

Could it use a few more ships where it works well? Yeah, probably. But I'm not entirely sure what those hypothetical ships would look like. Maybe something kindof like the shrike but with a more general-purpose mobility system and extra small turrets instead of the medium? Maybe? I dunno.

Just spitballin a quick idea even if it's not super related to the thread.

Something with a similar setup of the Odyssey could see use of IR Pulse Lasers, Gigacannons and Paladins. So bunch of small energy mounts, zero mediums and then a couple of large energies so that it makes low flux weapons more desirable.

Odyssey is seriously nice with a bunch of IR Pulse Lasers but it kinda switched to a semi-missile ship with a few changes. Switched large energy to synergy, removed the tight convergence point, much more speed potential but also weaker shields. It wants to use missiles. And it also has fighters. So something without all of those boons should be ideally motivated to have a unique setup of weapons.

And for the love of god please no more "move only forward" ship systems, half ot the roster has that ability.

Back to the main topic now: IR Pulse Lasers have good DPS for their size but horrible damage per shot, you know what's the complete opposite? It's Gigacannon, bingo! Match made in heaven yet there isn't a single ship where this loadout makes sense.

Is it?

Look, not saying that you cannot make it work. But like... The only thing that goes in the small slots of my Odyssey are mining lasers (unless i have access to certain redacted weapons).

There are 12 small slots on an Odyssey and Making IR Pulse good for this is... kind of iffy. You can go front side only and this is 25 OP. Vs 5 OP for mining lasers. And you can surround the ship in them in order to make it really good frigate defense which you don't really need in an Odyssey... but this is 60 OP.

If IR pulse one shot missiles then i would say "yes" but they don't so you cannot even build in IPDAI and make a lot of use out of them on an Odyssey.

I think a handful of Ion Cannons are good on an Odyssey(one on the nose mainly) in order to disable fighters. But this is kind of the limit of high cost small energy i am willing to put on it. I would rather have the slots empty (which is what i did before the mining laser buff) than put IRpulse in it most of the time.

Edit: i know you say "pair with a giga-cannon" but... Yea i would just rather have plasma in all situations. Both because you want your "big burst" to land AFTER you run up their flux with the weak attacks. And IRPulse is 500 unless you IPDAI build in while Giga is 700.

The real pair for an IR pulse is AMB. And it works pretty well on ships like the Scarab and maybe the wolf.

[Grievous69]

I said similar and then explained how such a ship would look like. Why are you focusing on the Odyssey so hard when I immediately made it clear that such setups aren't good on it because of other weapons + fighters?

[Goumindong]

I said similar and then explained how such a ship would look like. Why are you focusing on the Odyssey so hard when I immediately made it clear that such setups aren't good on it because of other weapons + fighters?

Odyssey is seriously nice with a bunch of IR Pulse Lasers