Kourtious' Equipment and Ship Guide

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Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

This is an Equipment & Ship guide list by me, Kourtious! This guide includes both Eternity Port and Corporate Command Expansions.

There will be spoilers! In the future, I may take time to split them into spoilers and non-spoilers.

So these are my suggestions and take them if you agree. Otherwise, give criticisms and insight and your opinions as to what I've missed and what I could add. I will try to update once a week.

Exceptional - Equipment that hit above their weight. Almost always good to use and at times, overpowered.
Good - Generally reliable and good in most situations.
Alright - Seems ok but have difficulty being useful beyond its description.
Poor - These aren't with your time and money getting.

Equipment:
Exceptional:
Lithium Booster - Perhaps one of the most effective and key devices to making an unstoppable Thermo Weapon.
Bushido Weapon Enhancer - Use this with the Katana Star Cannon. Also works with the Hanzo Blaster, making it kind of relevant for a level 7 weapon.

Good:
Transpace Jumpdrive - Allows you jump out of tough situations without using powers and allows you to travel very quickly between stargates. There is a secret gimmick to this device.
Longreach I - Probably the best equipment you can get late game. Having this makes your life very easy for one particular boss.
Patch Spider - Can repair most armor. Just remember to turn it off during fights.
Cannon Accelerator - Great damage booster.

Alright:
Particle Accelerator - Particle Weapons tend to be weaker in the Ungoverned Territories.
Makayev Weapon Enhancer - Useful for Mark III base busting.
Rasiermesser Weapon Enhancer - Good for transitioning from Dual Flenser Cannon to Akan Weapons or Thorin Cannon.
Laser Collimator - Early game damage booster. Less effective than Cannon Accelerator due to laser having no WMD.

Poor:
Heisenmachines Quantum CPU - The usables associated often do not provide enough reason to take up a valuable device slot. The device becomes useless late game.
ICX Missile Defense - Investing in better armor is usually better than buying this.

Primary Weapons:
Exceptional:
Lamplighter Archcannon - Strongest Weapon in the Human Realm.
Chimera Graviton Cannon [CC] - Has the rarest and most powerful damage type, allowing you to rip through human armor (and even some alien ones) like paper.
Advanced Tritium Cannon - Strongest Thermo Weapon. The time it takes to overheat is long enough to last a fight.
Omnidirectional Thermo Cannon - Once enhanced and equipped with a Thermo Autofac, this weapon is surprisingly useful at all stage of the game.
Thera Cannon [CC] - Hands down, best ion cannon in the game. With high per shot damage, good WMD, splash damage, and commonly lootable ammo, this weapon is very powerful for its level.
Katana Star Cannon - High Damage and passthrough makes this weapon incredibly versatile. The passthrough makes it a pseudo WMD weapon.
Dragonfly Missile System - Amazing weapon level for its level. Great damage, high WMD, fast and good tracking, good range, cheap ammo, and low energy usage.

Good:
Ares Positron Cannon - A powerful alternative to unenhanced Ion Weapons.
Dvalin Ion9 Cannon - A great shield busting and swarm destroying weapon.
Kytryn Blaster - Powerful but somewhat unreliable weapon for WMD. It's alright to use as a base buster.
Chimera Plasma Cannon [CC] - A relatively early plasma based weapon that can deal decent damage.
Ferian Plasma Cannon - A relatively early cloud based plasma cannon that can act as a howitzer.
Ares Micronuke Launcher - When enhanced, this weapon becomes one of the most potent base busting and swarm clearing weapons in the game.
Hecates Cannon - A rare Ares weapon that you can find from Deimos ships. It has the highest WMD of all the howitzers.
Advanced Taubeam [EP] - A fantastic particle beam weapon that can enhanced to crazy levels.
PM6 Slicer - One of the best weapons you can get before crossing into the Ungoverned Territories.
Heavy Slam Cannon - Good general weapon.
Lancer Cannon - Not as versatile as the Dual Particle Beam Cannon but it's much more lethal for its single target damage.
Dwarg Xiphon Cannon - Essentially a better slam cannon but almost impossible to find before it becomes irrelevant.
Slam Cannon - Good general weapon.
Chimeric Ion Cannon [CC] - Fast firing and has one of the earliest ion attribute damage that you can get, allowing to rip through most armor easily.
Particle Beam Cannon - If you can find it early game, it will shred the shield and armor of most enemies.
Advanced Urak Driver - Underrated and powerful. Only weakness is its range and poor accuracy.
Dual Turbolaser - Good general use weapon.
Lancelot Cannon [EP] - Can be found very early on. Deals high damage at the cost of no WMD.
Chimera Seeker Cannon [CC] - A tracking but limited range blast cannon.
Rasiermesser SmartCannon - A very useful but slightly costly weapon. Enhancing the weapon makes it easy to get through the first couple of systems.
Heavy CLAW Cannon - Can bust through most starting armor and stations. Only weakness is its range and that it takes up two slots.

Alright:
Qianlong Archcannon - Theoretically the most powerful weapon in the game IF you have enough longzhu spheres to maintain it.
Positron Lancer - For an endgame weapon, WMD is highly suggested. There are many mission related alternatives that will deal an incredible amount of damage along with WMD.
Xenophobe Ion Cannon - I've never found this weapon to be useful because it comes too late in the game but if you do, it does its job mediocrely.
Hanzo Blaster - Particle is not worth investing in at level 7. However, you may get this weapon for free once you reach a certain rank in the Black Market.
Nadao Bolt Cannon - A particle base buster. Common ammo and can be enhanced to be deadly. Be aware of enemy particle resistance later in the game.
Akan 600 Cannon - Only get the Dvalin enhanced version of this weapon. Otherwise the cost of the shells is not worth it.
Akan 30 Cannon - Everything about this weapon is good except for the high cost of the shells. You can loot plenty in the Outer Realms, but blast is weak by that point.
Dual Flenser Cannon - A powerful and cheap weapon for its tier. Unfortunately, Kinetic is weak at level 5.
AK505 Ballista Cannon - A good base buster but limiting in fights.
CLAW Cannon - Very High damage, but very limiting range. Also takes up two slots.
Laser Cannon Array - Alright, fast firing. This weapon is able to deal with swarms well but is worse off than the Turbolaser for single target dps.
Chimera Laser Cannon [CC] - A weak laser cannon that hits above its weak.

Poor:
Iocrym Fracture Cannon - The range is very very limiting.
SAR/200 Advanced Cannon - It's barely better than a Advanced Tritium Cannon while using up two precious slots.
TM7 multitarget Cannon - Powerful weapon but the ammo is very expensive.
Kiloton Cannon - An alright weapon until you realize the ammo takes up a lot of space and is expensive.
Dual Tev9 Blaster - Unless you are getting this weapon for free or early on, this weapon is not worth it.
Dual Mark III Howitzer - Appealing at first, but blast at level 7 is not a good investment unless you do not have a military ID.
X-Ray Laser Cannon - Laser is a weak damage type by the time you usually find this weapon.
Penitent Cannon - It's low damage for how much energy it uses makes it a poor weapon even if its damage type is unstoppable.
Moskva 21 Cannon - The range and damage is limiting.
Centauri Recoilless - Anything to be said?

Launchers:
Exceptional:
Nami Heavy Launcher - Arguably the best end-game launcher.
Luminous Launcher [EP] - Hands down, best single target launcher but extremely difficult to get.
Makayev Launcher - Very Cheap, Fast, High DPS, and Saturating. Unfortunately, it's strongest missile is not good at destroying larger late-game ships.
Mag Launcher - Cheap, High Damage, Good WMD, and viable endgame. Its ammo range can deal with all types of enemies from swarms, to high shields, and base busting.

Good:
Taoko Launcher [EP] - Very very cheap ammo. Only drawback is that its strongest missile is slow and not maneuverable, making it hard to recommend late-game.
NAMI Launcher - You get it because of Stilettos Missiles and its high availability. Has a powerful high tier missile that can be made early game.

Alright:
Rasiermesser Launcher - Powerful and Fast missiles. Unfortunately, its high cost and no splash damage makes it difficult to recommend over its competitors.
Ares Missile Launcher - A shockingly powerful base busting launcher but the missiles it contains move relatively slowly and do not deal the same instantaneous damage as its competitors.
Chimera Plasma Launcher [CC] - Tracking, and mediocre WMD and dps. Fortunately, looting the ammo is plenty and the damage type is plasma, meaning you can fire all day and still pack a punch.
Archura Launcher [EP] - Kind of cheap ammo that offers energy based WMD (particle and ion). No tracking and often not as potent for base busting as its competitors.
Burak Launcher [CC] - You need the Uzon tracker to make this weapon competitive to the NAMI Launcher. The missiles are also rarer to loot. Thankfully, its extremely high WMD makes it a competitive base buster against higher tier launchers.

Poor:
Krypton Launcher - Armor can be easily penetrated, but internal hit points are a huge pain to deal with. NAMI Heavy Launchers are better at WMD for a cheaper price and more common missiles.
Orkan Launcher [CC] - An underwhelming launcher for the damage it deals. The missile variety often overlap with lower tier launchers and the lack of high level missiles, make it pointless to transition to.
Nami Mine Launcher - Mostly a gimmick.

Ships
Exceptional:
Centurion/X-class Heavy Gunship - Best skirmisher in the game. The high maneuverability may make it difficult for the player to control.
Minotaur-class Corvette - You can fire an additional omnidirectional weapon in addition to your primary and launcher. Also, good storage, 6 plates, and no weapon based device restrictions.
Evren-class Heavy Gunship [EP] - Barely sacrificing any mobility, you get an additional and very useful device slot. Also, good storage, 6 plates, and no weapon based device restrictions.
EI500 Freighter - Has 10 device slots, the most in the game. Can equip massive armor and has great storage. Only issue is its maneuverability and only 2 weapon slots.


Good:
Helgoland-class Freighter [CC] - A fun freighter/warship with a Rasiermesser primary omnidirectional attachment, 6 plates, and a large storage. The maneuverability isn't bad either.
Manticore-class Heavy Gunship [CC] - The Novoya Armor Repairer is best armor repair device and comes with the ship at the cost of it using the shield slot.
Raijan-class Gunship [EP] - The swivel function makes any APD weapon more powerful. Unfortunately, the fact that the swivel makes the weapon external can be very costly to the use.
Spartan-class Gunship [EP] - A well rounded jack of all trades.

Alright:
Sapphire-class Yacht - The small size of the ship makes up for its shortcomings.
Wolfen-class Gunship - At first, the thrills of a fast thrusters and quick maneuvers excite you but then the tiny storage makes you sad.
Freyr-class Gunship [CC]- The Rasiermesser primary weapon swivel is a nice bonus but Rasiermesser primary weapons are mediocre, making it a slightly weaker wolfen.
Hercules-class Freighter [EP] - This freighter can have 6 armor plates but otherwise an inferior EI500.

Poor:
EI200 Freighter - The extremely poor maneuverability does not make up for the massive cargo. You need to fight most of the time and that additional storage will go unused.
Constellation-class Freighter [CC] - The auton feature becomes a gimmick towards the later stages of the game. Instead, you are left with an awkward jack of all trades.
Last edited by Kourtious on Tue Jan 21, 2020 2:36 am, edited 9 times in total.
Ferdinand
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
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Location: Dancing in the universe
Contact:

About the cost of ammo and missiles.
Those are basically for free as soon as you find a Teraton fabricator. You only need (damaged) armor and an energy source (like those He rods you loot and are basically useless in the endgame) as soon as you have the fabricator satisfied with a bit of food....
Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

I often find myself rich enough to not concern myself with the cost of ammo but that's now. Before when I was a newbie, I never got enough money to get freely spam ammo towards a Ares Shipyard and still be left enough to blow up 5 more. But yeah, that's definitely something to know for newer players that are short on cash.
Ferdinand
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 220
Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2015 2:35 pm
Location: Dancing in the universe
Contact:

There is one more very useful device you forgot to mention that can save your life in an instant or help you cross vast amounts of space in no time at al, that is the Jump drive.
- Very useful to either escape a fight if you are about to be blown to smithereens...
- Store unlimited items safely in Elysium
- Use Elysium as a shortcut to other systems.
- Travel the distance between two stars in a binary system instantaneous.
- Any occasion you have that is about 500 ly away :D
Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

@Ferdinand Thanks! I forgot about the device. I just tried it in the game. I found it do be good but I often found myself using it only for a brief part of the game before I felt the device slot could have better uses.

Updates!
-Added a ship section! I hope it's controversial and at the same time not.
-I added some more weapons to the list.
-Renamed a few things.
-Fixed a few mistakes.

I plan on adding shields later and eventually spoilers.
Admiral Skippy
Anarchist
Anarchist
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 1:44 pm

One weapon I've found rather fun in the early face of my most recent run is the Chimeric Seeker Cannon which you can find on the chimeric ships in Corporate Command.

Essentially it's similar to the Smart Cannon in that it trivialises most enemies up until about Rigel Aurelius (and if you're using a missile launcher, can happily see you through to St. Katherine's Star), because the tracking function means that most shots are hitting enemies so the effective DPS is higher. The DPS is a bit less than a Smart Cannon, but the Blast damage type partly makes up for that, and you don't need to buy a cannon accelerator or ammunition, or dedicate cargo space to endless Smart Cannon rounds. Weapon enhancement ROMs are plentiful enough in later editions of the game (and lose usefulness in the the late game) such that it's not a terrible investment to use one as you're unlikely to use one. Personally I would say the biggest drawback is the relatively short range.

Still you effectively spend nothing, which can be nice if you're saving to purchase a serious weapon later on for the Arena or for getting to Sanctuary.

The Chimeric Ion Blaster does not actually look terrible either, but I've never used it.
Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

@Admiral Skippy

Yeah, those weapons are pretty good right?

There are two more secret weapons but it involves you failing one of the Chimera missions somewhat. You can then farm them for the rarest weapon type in the game. Unfortunately for that specific weapon, its requirements maybe too limiting to use.
Admiral Skippy
Anarchist
Anarchist
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 1:44 pm

Yeah, I think they're pretty good.

Probably this is not what you were referring to, but I've also used the Chimeric plasma missile launcher before (I know that's not the exact name, but I forget what it is now), and it's also pretty reasonable, certainly if you're still using a standard NAMI launcher by that point.

At the time you encounter the third Chimera station, Plasma is still a very advanced damage type, one the player is unlikely to have unless they've looted themselves a Ferian Plasma Cannon. (And who actually does that more than once?) The DPS and range are both good, and ammunition is absurdly abundant on slain enemies, usually enough to last until your next launcher. Probably the biggest drawback is that as I recall, the [WMD] isn't that high, which is a serious downer if you're running the kind of ship which really relies on a launcher to crack stations. It's not impossible by any means, but it becomes a little more time-consuming.

On the other hand, if you're the sort of player who also has a howitzer in addition to their regular weapon, or just uses a howitzer (or possibly the Star Cannon) full stop, then you probably aren't going to mind about that as much, because you've got other options.

The big thing with all the chimeric weapons is that you either have to be willing to locate and "farm" the station for a while so that you can find an undamaged weapon, or essentially leave it up to luck as to whether you'll find one. Unless you're doing a no-backtrack game where a decent free weapon is really useful, or especially enjoy using them, I'm not sure that investing the time is necessarily worth it in every run.
Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

@Admiral Skippy

You're right. I am hinting at a more amazing weapon. Imo, the Chimera Plasma Launcher is an alright weapon (I also forgot its name, I will do a run and go explore). It's definitely good for skirmishing and it's good enough to be enhanced either with Domina powers or (if it is a cannon then a weapon optimizer). Either which makes it plenty more useful to use.
Sarin
Anarchist
Anarchist
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2018 2:26 pm

Having just finished the game, I have to say you're selling the dual MkIII howitzer short. It has high WMD rating, and equipped with high speed loader and stacked domina boost/hexagene it remain best base/capital ship buster primary between St.K. and Jiang's star. Since swarmers in those areas are generally easy to take out by kiting and few well placed missiles, it can remain potent weapon for a long time...I used it up to Juno without problems and bagged even few Phobos dreadnoughts with it on hardest difficulty.
Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

There are much better options than Dual Mark IIIs, especially since you can get thermo weapons that can output good dps while saving a device slot. For example, you can get High Speed Howitzer Loader, Lithium Booster and a thermo based howitzer for 1 less device slot and higher tier damage. Also, the cost of Dual Mark IIIs are almost equivalent to a level 8 weapon and is probably harder to make than finding a level 8 thermo weapon. So I don't see a point to getting the weapon.

The only way I can see the weapon being worth it is if Makayev Weapon Enhancers still applied to it because it would give a 75% damage boost that will allow it to be competitive.
Sarin
Anarchist
Anarchist
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2018 2:26 pm

Dual MkIII does not take two slots.

I did not have trouble finding the stuff for it...I could build it as far back as RA. Biggest problem was the reactor to sustain it, fortunately I got 150MW one in St.K.

The first thermo to have similar DPS is fusionfire howitzer. But the difference is low, and against capships, the dual has advantage since the two off-center shots are less likely to be taken out by the capship's omni weapons than single centerline shot.

And since I was saving all my tritium injectors for advanced tritium cannon, the hugely boosted dual MkIII outperformed the fusionfire in my game.
Kourtious
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 187
Joined: Fri Nov 14, 2014 10:00 pm
Location: Off in the distance

Oh! I thought it did. Last time I used it, it was a disappointing experience. Thanks for telling me. I'll confirm this in my free time. One other reason why I wouldn't go Dual Mark IIIs are some enemies with really high blast immunity that you may encounter in the Ungoverned Territories. "It's fine" if you can get it for cheap is what I will say.
Derakon
Militia Lieutenant
Militia Lieutenant
Posts: 175
Joined: Sat Jan 21, 2017 2:53 am

For what it's worth, here's my typical upgrade path:

SmartCannon + Cannon Accelerator and either NAMI or Burak launcher (whichever I start with or find first): see me through to St. Kat's. Homing, fast-firing, cheap ammo, pretty good damage, and it's a guaranteed drop in the first system.

Mk.3 howitzer + Makayev enhancer (+ howitzer speed loader when I find it) and Makayev launcher: sees me through the Ungoverned Territories and the early Outer Realm. This isn't even the dual, just a single howitzer (because I can't be bothered to deal with tinkers), but it's +75% +fast which is pretty dang effective. Towards the end it starts to wane a bit, but fortunately Black Strelkas can more than pick up the slack.

From here, take your pick:
* Dual Fusionfire + lithium injector + howitzer speed loader to keep the howitzer train running. Excellent DPS and base-cracking. The recoil is a bit tricky though. For maximum cheese, pair this with a couple of side-mounted Mk5 howitzers and enjoy never flying forwards while firing ever again.
* Thermo cannon (or omni thermo cannon if you don't like aiming) + lithium injector + thermo shell nanofac: stupidly OP. The thermo cannon was not balanced around having unlimited ammo and it shows. If you want a win, go with this.
* Advanced tritium cannon + lithium injector: good option for Wolfens which have limited non-weapon slots. The advanced tritium cannon has pretty good DPS, but its projectiles lack range and speed compared to the above two options, and it also doesn't usually show up as early.

Speaking of Wolfens, they may consider mounting a TM7 as a secondary weapon for dealing with smaller ships. It's basically an upgraded Dragonfly.

And for launchers, either stick with the Makayev (Black Strelkas are really quite good against large ships as long as you hit them broadside, which allows more of the fragments to hit the target), or upgrade to the Rasiermesser. The Rasiermesser is undoubtedly powerful but kind of boring. I find the NAMI heavy to be irritating to use; lots of ammo types to juggle and they're all heavy. The Ares launcher is cool as hell but its actual damage output is unimpressive.

Notice that all of the endgame weapons are thermo. Ion is sadly outclassed as it lack WMDs and the Tesla enhancer is awful, boosting damage against shields only (a.k.a. maybe the first 10% of the damage you deal). Positron, plasma, and antimatter are even worse off, having no enhancements possible at all. Speaking of which, for maximum power you can order tritium injectors from the Corporate Trading Posts and dump 15 of them onto your chosen endgame weapon for +200% damage (counting the lithium booster) or +300% with Domina Strength active. Even Luminous Drones with thermo shields don't last long against that kind of damage output.
wnmnkh
Miner
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Posts: 43
Joined: Wed Oct 04, 2006 8:48 am

Derakon wrote:
Wed Mar 11, 2020 3:06 am

* Dual Fusionfire + lithium injector + howitzer speed loader to keep the howitzer train running. Excellent DPS and base-cracking. The recoil is a bit tricky though. For maximum cheese, pair this with a couple of side-mounted Mk5 howitzers and enjoy never flying forwards while firing ever again.
This build was my end-game build for my recent run.

It is also extremely good at cleaning swarm of small ships with all of splash damage as well.
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